


The Last Laugh

by umqra1895



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Anal Sex, Animal Death, Backstory, Bisexuality, Bullying, Dom/sub, F/M, First Time Blow Jobs, First Time Topping, Gay Bashing, Light BDSM, M/M, Murder, Psychopathology & Sociopathy, Psychopaths In Love, Rape, Revenge, Sexuality, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-27
Updated: 2017-03-13
Packaged: 2018-09-14 15:52:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 14
Words: 53,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9190400
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/umqra1895/pseuds/umqra1895
Summary: Sebastian Moran had it all going for him - a position as captain on the rugby team, a great girlfriend, and a popular group of friends - until Jim Moriarty came into his life and turned everything he knew upside down.





	1. Translation

_Come as you are, as you were_  
_As I want you to be_  
 _As a friend, as a friend_  
 _As an known enemy_

**_"Come As You Are" - Nirvana (1991)_**

_October 1995_  

“Moran, Moriarty,” Ms. Beauchamp said, flipping the page on her pairing list.

Sebastian sagged in his seat, trying not to be too obvious about his disappointment. Then again, who in his biology class would blame him? Nobody would want to get sat next to Jim Moriarty as a lab partner for the longest lab of the year.

He grudgingly turned to look back at Jim, meeting his eyes. _Your desk or mine?_ Sebastian's eyebrows asked. Moriarty stared flatly back. The boy was...well, there was a reason why nobody hung around him. He was plain creepy. Sebastian couldn’t say precisely what was so disarming about him. Maybe it was his flat black eyes, or the fact that he always looked irritated or bored. He put off an air that he couldn’t be bothered with anyone but himself, and so everyone let him well alone. Moriarty was two years Sebastian's junior, meaning he should be a year 11, but there was a giant brain behind that protruding forehead of his, because he was in year 13 with the 17-year-olds.

Sebastian resigned himself that he would have to move, and grabbed his books, moving to the very back of the room where Moriarty sat. He gave a fleeting look to Miranda Velasquez on his way back. He’d rather hoped to be paired with her instead.

He tried to be polite, when he sat down at Jim’s table, giving him a brief nod. Ms. Beauchamp had finished pairing up the students and there was a general, grumbling scuffle as students rearranged themselves.

Moriarty had yet to even look at him. “This will be easiest if you stay out of my way,” he muttered under his breath as he turned the textbook open to the required section. “I can assure us top marks if you just keep your oafish hands off the thing.”

Sebastian stared at him, affronted. For fuck's sake, he hadn't said _anything_ to Moriarty ever, and the first thing out of the rude little sod's mouth was an insult.

“I'm not idiotic, you know,” Sebastian said, thumbing open his own textbook.

Moriarty snorted derisively. “Yes, you are.” His shoulders drew closer together, seemingly wanting to put as much distance between himself and Sebastian as possible. “Frankly, I don't know how you have any brain cells left after bashing rugby opponents on a daily basis. How many concussions have you had by now?”

Ms. Beauchamp was now handing out the assignment sheets for preliminary research notes. “You will have the remainder of the class to get started on your preliminary research for the pig dissection. Don't skimp on this; it will be essential for the success of your project, and we don't want to fall behind, do we?”

Sebastian accepted the assignment sheet, then turned back to Moriarty and muttered between his teeth, “I'm not some idiot jock.”

“You certainly hang around enough of them.” Moriarty’s voice had turned from sneering to acidic.

Sebastian stared at the assignment sheet, his fist curling on the desk. The words blurred. So this was why everyone loathed Jim Moriarty; he clearly thought he was better than everyone, cavalierly lumping people into categories so he could look down his pale nose at them.

“You know, most people aren't that bad if you give them a chance,” he found himself saying. His eyes flicked up to Miranda, who was walking past their lab table to sharpen her pencil. She gave him a sympathetic smile, quickly whisking by.

Moriarty's laugh was harsh. “I don’t need to give them chances to know that they’re all liars and idiots.” He was furiously writing down notes on their worksheet as he flung his words at Sebastian. His thin, spidering scrawl looked like a madman's writing. “Including all your so-called friends.”

“How do you know who my friends are, anyway?” Sebastian retorted. “I have lots of friends.”

Moriarty actually spared him a glance up for that, his thin eyebrows rising. “Please, I don't need reminding that you have lots of friends. Sebastian Moran swans in with his international reputation and a month later, he’s gone from ‘intriguing new boy’ to the golden child of St. Cuthbert's. If you were smart, you'd do it for some sort of gain. Instead you fritter it away on...sport.” He said the final word with distaste.

“I don't have an international reputation-” Sebastian said, beginning to feel self-conscious. Had Moriarty really been paying so much attention to him? His fists returned to curl against his knees. Moriarty made it sound like it had been effortless. Did he even fucking know how _exhausting_ it was, charming everyone, convincing everyone that he was socially laid-back but athletically competitive, that he wasn’t an idiot or a nerd, that he was sexually suave but wasn’t a creep?

“But you do, though, don't you? You've had tutors and education in, what, five different countries? And your mother is a British ambassador of some renown...not to mention your father's rank in the military puts him in high standing, even if his Irish lineage does not.” Moriarty’s black eyes glittered. “I know a thing or two about that.”

Sebastian stared at him in complete shock. “How?” How could he possibly know?

“Close your mouth, you’re not a codfish,” Moriarty chirped in a perfectly prim Mary Poppins voice. “Don't worry, it's not that you're anything special,” he assured him, easily returning to that bored, Irish lilt. “Other than the fact that you've risen the ranks so quickly in this stupid school, there's nothing at all remarkable about you. You're disgustingly ordinary. And your marks in biology aren't stellar, so just let me do the driving, mm?”

Sebastian was dumbfounded. Moriarty hardly ever talked in class, and now he couldn't seem to stop, lobbing insults one after another, and asserting things he had no business knowing.

Confusion and astonishment gave way to familiar, dangerous fury, and Sebastian tried hard to tamp it back down. The last thing he needed was to have another outburst. His hands were still curled into fists, and he stared at his paper, not able to focus on the words. He took a deep breath, then another. He would keep his cool.

“Oo, anger issues. Is that why you play rugby?” Moriarty’s tone was so light and cultured that he might as well have had a china teacup perched in his hand. The shift in tone was so swift that Sebastian could have mistaken his voice for someone else. “Keep everything in check?”

“What can I say? I'm competitive.” Sebastian’s jaw clenched.

Moriarty's mouth quirked up slightly, not looking up him as he flicked a couple pages forward in his textbook and jotted down some more answers. “There are more interesting ways to be competitive. With your social pull, you could do so much more. It’s a pity that your ambitions are so tiny.”

Sebastian considered this, frowning. What did he mean, he could do so much more? “And who do you compete with, then?” Sebastian snapped.

Moriarty sighed petulantly, looking up from the worksheet. “I don't have any competition, at the moment. It does get so very _boring.”_ He mock-pouted, looking over at Sebastian. “Perhaps that's why I'm such a troubled youth,” he said with sarcastic concern, straight-faced.

Sebastian couldn't help it. He laughed a bit at that, and he couldn't figure out if it was discomfort at Moriarty's sudden changes and insincere manner, or because he genuinely found it amusing.

“Done,” Moriarty said, pushing his worksheet toward Sebastian.

“You're finished? How?” He leaned over the sheet. Up close it was slightly easier to read, but it was still a mess; All the letters were mismatched, angling forward and then backward, each line of text swooping up and down like telephone wires.

“I read the chapter a while ago. We only need one copy per table, so your work is done. No need to thank me.”

“Don't worry, I won't.” Sebastian eyed the clock. There were only a few minutes until the bell.

Moriarty snorted. “Don't be so soft about it. There's nothing a nobody like me could say that would lower your precious social status or massive ego,” he said, then angled his head up to look in Miranda's direction. Her back was to Sebastian, her thick, dark braid tumbling down the back of her uniform jumper. “And yes, she would fancy a date with you. Since you were wondering.”

Sebastian really was too startled to be angry this time. “How do you know that?”

“I use my eyes and my brain, Moran,” Jim said mockingly.

It was hardly a satisfactory answer. The bell for lunch rang, and by the time Sebastian had packed up his books, Moriarty had already darted out the door without another word.

He was so bewildered by the entire encounter that he almost missed Miranda, who was lingering in the laboratory's doorway for him. He had befriended her during the last lab, when they had been partnered together, and they had taken to chatting while walking to the lunchroom.

“Paired up with Moriarty,” she grinned. “How was _that_?”

Sebastian blew out a sigh, accompanying her down the chaotic hallway toward the canteen. “For fuck's sake, he doesn't say a word and then the second I go within ten feet of him, he's just this endless barrage of disparaging remarks.”

Miranda laughed lightly. “He'll be voted Most Liked, to be sure.” Her smile faded. “He is odd, though. I’m not saying he deserves all the scorn he gets, but he’s...hard to like. I went to primary school with him, you know.”

Primary school. Sebastian tried to imagine Jim Moriarty as a young child. Shorter, perhaps, but still thin, with dark, intense eyes. “What was that like?” Was he as unsettling as a child?

Miranda shook her head, turning the corner of the corridor. “He was...odd,” she said vaguely.

“He said I had a massive ego,” Sebastian groused.

“Oh, I'm sorry, do you not?” Miranda asked, looking at him with wide, innocent eyes, then grinned and elbowed him.

“Oy,” Sebastian laughed. They entered the canteen. Usually they parted ways, but Sebastian felt slightly more confident after Miranda’s little nudge. “Want to sit with me and Barnes and the rest today?”

“Erm...” Miranda looked over uncomfortably at the table where Sebastian usually sat, with Barnes and Powers and Sundarum.

“You're always welcome,” Sebastian said. He could already see he was fighting a losing battle.

“Sorry, Sebastian. It’s sweet of you to ask, but...I think Mindy wanted to gossip about her French tutor,” she said apologetically, rolling her eyes. “But I'll see you before the last block of the day, right?”

Sebastian nodded. “‘Course. Till then.”

He made his way to the table of his rugby mates, and Toby Barnes immediately clapped him on the back as he sat. Toby was the broadest of the bunch, a veritable wall when he was play defense, and the thump of his hand made Sebastian buckle forward a bit. “Oi, Basher! Are you finally getting it on with Velasquez?”

“I wouldn't say getting it on,” Sebastian said, putting down his satchel.

“Well, it won't be hard,” Carl Powers said loudly. “She's an absolute tart, she is.”

Sebastian winced at the words and sat, looking at his teammates' trays to see the day's offerings. Pork pie and potatoes, each about the same shade of beige. “That’s uncalled for, mate,” he muttered.

Carl Powers was only well-liked, as far as Sebastian could tell, because nobody wanted to be on his nasty side. He was handsome in a blocky way, his jaw so square that it practically had 90-degree angles. He kept his rusty-coloured hair buzzed short year round, even during the swim team’s off season. He towered over the rest of the rugby team, his long limbs and large appendages seemingly engineered specifically for cutting through the water. Powers was good at rugby, but it was only a distraction for him until swim season came, when he really shone as the school’s crowning jewel. The trophy case outside the pool was practically a shrine to him.

“What, you don’t believe me?” Powers spat, his hand closing on the back of Sebastian’s neck, and he leaned in to mutter, “Or is it that you just don’t _want_ to believe me?”

Sebastian forced a tight smile, trying not to cringe underneath Powers’ grip. If he could punch anyone full in the face at this school, it would be him. But Sebastian had to play the game. He felt fury at Moriarty again. _You think it’s easy, being well-liked, when it means having to like_ this _arsehole?_

“Come off it, Powers. Like you would know,” David Sundarum cut in around a mouthful of pork pie.

“Mate, I never told you about the party this summer? She was a _rude_ piece of ass _._ ”

Sebastian rose quickly as Powers began to describe in disgusting detail his various sexual exploits over the summer. “And then there was Sally Jacobson. She had the tightest-” Sebastian couldn’t walk away fast enough. He went through the lunch line, distractedly piling up his plate. He couldn’t stop thinking about Moriarty’s cutting words. How Moriarty had been apparently keeping a closer eye on him than his aloof demeanor would suggest. How Moriarty said he was “wasting” his potential.

Sebastian had charming new people down to a science. He moved around so much that he had to be good at making friends quickly. It was easiest to choose the path of least resistance, falling in with the first people most likely to be friends with him who wouldn’t turn him into a complete social outcast. It seemed calculating and cold, but it wasn’t as if he hung around for long. And it was better than passing through school as the perpetual outsider, all alone.

And anyway, this was his last year before university, so what did it matter who he hung around with, anyway? He had tried keeping up with old friends from Germany, from Pakistan. But they always fell out of touch, wrapped up with the friends who were right in front of them. Friends were, as far as Sebastian was now concerned, something you had when you needed them, and then when you moved on, so did they. They were temporary means to an end.

He grabbed his lunch tray and headed back for his table. His eyes drifted to Miranda. He viewed girlfriends in the same way that he did friends. Girlfriends were a commitment, and relationships he’d witnessed always seemed to end messily. There were good bits to have a girlfriend, of course...the obvious bits. But Sebastian preferred a brief tussle and then to move on. But even that got messy.

Sebastian realized that he was glancing about the canteen, scanning for Moriarty’s dark hair. Everyone in double biology had the same lunch section, so Moriarty should be here. He should be conspicuous, sitting off in some corner alone. Now that Sebastian thought about it, he couldn’t remember ever seeing him here. Perhaps he ate alone, hunched somewhere quiet. The idea made him sad before he remembered how rude Moriarty had been to him.

He sat back down with his mates, who were now arguing about who the fittest girl in school was.

“It’s Kari Brown, without a doubt,” Barnes was saying. “She’s a ten, if not a ten point five.”

“You have to use the allotted scale of zero to ten, or the whole ranking is pointless,” Sundarum laughed. “Basher, you shagged Brown, didn’t you?”  

“Hmm?” Sebastian tuned back into the conversation, already bored with it. “Eh, no. I think you’re thinking of Isa Redford?”

“Oh, Christ, yeah…” Barnes gave a rather wistful sigh. “She’s the one with that arse...fucking hell, Moran, what was that like?”

Sebastian rolled his eyes. “There’s a time and a place, yeah?” he muttered.

He didn’t understand how the blokes at this school managed to chat about girls in such close proximity to them. It all seemed so juvenile. He had a theory that the less experienced one was, the more they talked about their shags. His own experience supported this theory, at least. When he had been fourteen, he had chatted about sex nonstop. He’d just started fooling around, and had come to the discovery that sex was, as he’d suspected it to be, the _best thing ever._ And it had been imperative that he proved to everyone that he was having it, and a lot of it, and the highest quality of it, even if in actuality he had only had a few eager, clumsy fucks with a German girl with large breasts for her age. While had been enjoyable for them both, it had hardly been the acrobatic, pornographic dream that Sebastian had painted it as to his friends.

Now that he was seventeen and had fooled around with nearly fifteen girls from three different continents, he didn’t see the need to talk about it all the time. His father would call it classless. And Sebastian knew, just like everyone else at the table,that Barnes, bless, was still a virgin. It had become glaringly obviously when Barnes, carried away with his story, said that he’d tongued a girl’s cervix. Everyone in the locker room had hidden their smirks.

It wasn’t that Barnes wasn’t attractive. He had a fit body, and his face wasn’t a hopeless, acne-covered mess like Sundarum’s, who had a girlfriend regardless. Barnes just got worked up and overexcited, and his eagerness came off as completely off-putting to practically every girl he dared to approach.

At any rate, Sebastian was eager to change the subject. “I was researching some statistics of the St. Alban’s league last night-”

“Oi, look at calculator over here,” Powers interjected, in what could be interpreted in an amiable way. He had always struck Sebastian as rather artificial, but he was the most valuable rugby player on the league, and Sebastian, as acting captain, had to make good with him.

“Stats can save your arse, Powers,” Sundarum cut in. “What did you find out, Basher?”

“We can trounce them on Friday if we defend strategically. We can’t just rely on our usual methods of playing it by ear.”

Carl rolled his eyes. “Can we save it for the pitch tonight, Captain? We’re off-duty.”

Sebastian tapped his fork impatiently on his tray as the lads turned back to coarser topics. He hadn’t lied when he’d told Moriarty that he loved competition. He loved the strategy of it, too. The better thought-out the victory, the greater the thrill when they won. Still…nobody liked an obsessive. He needed to cool off it if he didn’t want to be deemed a complete freak.

Considering it was only October, Sebastian’s social currency was in good nick- not many newcomers got a captain’s spot on a sports team. He knew it was pointless to care in the end, and he knew he wouldn’t keep up with any of these people when he went off to university, but it was always better to have a few people on his side. Moriarty could take a lesson that, for all his brilliance.

...Jesus, was he really thinking about him _again_?

After lunch was Sebastian’s favorite subject, Latin. It wasn’t that he had a particular passion for Latin in general- the syntax and grammar were driving him mad, even if the vocabulary was easy enough - but he loved learning a new language, tasting it on his tongue, finding the connections between English, Italian, French...

He had wanted to take French- it would have been an easy A since he’d lived in France last year, but his father had dismissed the idea, using the old argument that Sebastian should be “applying himself.” Fucking A.

 _Anger issues, is that why you play rugby?_ Moriarty had said. How had Moriarty seen that? Sebastian hadn’t snapped anything angrily at him. He found himself fluctuating between intrigue and fury at the fact that Moriarty seemed to be able to read him as easily as their biology textbook. And apparently trying to psychoanalyze him.

The rest of the day flew by - rugby practice in the drizzling autumn rain, then home for whatever dinner Sana put in front of him.

Sana had been employed with the Morans since their stint in Pakistan in 1992, and Sebastian had begged and pleaded for her to come along with them. Sana, being unwed, took up the employment offer, and had served as the family nanny, cook, and personal assistant, in whatever balance fit the family’s need and her 40-hour workweek. Although her job covered more than onet title could cover, she was officially an _ustani_ for Sebastian - his tutor and governess of sorts. Sebastian knew his father probably paid her well, but he was forever asking her why she’d taken up the offer.

“Because I care for his son,” she would say wryly, pushing back Sebastian’s hair. “Even when he gives me a headache.”

“Where are they tonight?” He asked, not actually caring about the answer.

“Ms. Moran is at a benefactors’ dinner in Parliament Hill,” Sana said, looking up briefly from one of her cookbooks. She had an entire shelf of cookbooks, and was forever testing new things off on Sebastian. Colette and August didn’t care, so long as their son ate wholesome food that kept his strength up.

Tonight it was comfort food- A warming bowl of nihari. Sebastian eagerly dug into the stew, savoring the lamb and the broth seasoned with cloves and spicy peppers. Sana hadn’t needed a recipe for this one- she knew her Pakistani dishes by heart, and they made both her and Sebastian nostalgic for Pakistan. Sebastian wrapped his hand around the warm bowl.

“And Mr. Moran is in a meeting until this evening.” Sebastian noted that Sana didn’t bother to say with who, and Sebastian couldn’t be arsed to keep up with what his parents were doing. Ever since they had returned to London, his parents- his mum in particular- had flung themselves back into high society with a gusto that made Sebastian nauseous. It was all so fake, and what was the point, in the end? Gaining accolades from other fake people? They tried so bloody hard. And for what?

“This plate doesn’t look quite right yet,” Sana teased, then heaped more rice onto his plate. “There. Perfection, yes?”

His parents’ homecoming was the same as always. Mother- always Mother, never Mum- came home smashed, eyeliner at the corner of her eye smudged, and then she made herself another martini. His father returned home a few hours later and instantly retreated to his home office, not bothering to greet either of them. Sebastian stayed downstairs long enough to greet them, or else Mother would put up a fuss about where he was, but as soon as she’d slurred her usual questions - _Did you have homework today? Did you finish your homework? Did you do your exercises?_ \- he was quick to go up to his room, putting in a Nirvana CD and cranking the volume up.

Were all adults this fucking fake and miserable? He was so bloody sick of being a teenager, but the alternative didn’t seem much better.

__

The next day in biology, Ms. Beauchamp wheeled in a tray of pig specimens, the sickening smell of formaldehyde filling the room.

“I want everyone’s gloves on before we begin. Mr. Channing, are you going to be all right this time?” The teacher looked pointedly at Philip Channing, who had a reputation for fainting at dissections. He was already looking rather peaky.

“M’fine,” he muttered, a light flush colouring his otherwise pale face.

Sebastian moved to sit next to Moriarty, who was hunched over a notebook, again scribbling furiously.

“What are you working on? Is that for class?”

“No,” Jim said, making it clear that that was the end of the discussion. “Get the supplies laid out,” he ordered, as if Sebastian was his inferior.

Sebastian considered telling him to fuck off, but instead, went back to the cabinet to grab out the list of supplies. Miranda brushed his shoulder.

“How’s drama rehearsal?” he asked, after scouring his brain for something intelligent to say.

She looked at him in surprise. “It’s going. The final production’s not until beginning of December, but Mr. McCantish is already having a panic attack about us remembering our lines. It’s the same every year. Oh- here.” She handed him a set of sutures and a scalpel. “Don’t let Moriarty slice anyone but the pig up with it,” she murmured conspiratorially.

“I’ll do my best,” Sebastian laughed.

When he returned to the table, the pig stared up at him. “Can I make the first incision?” he asked Jim.

“Does it fascinate you? Have you ever looked at the organs of something before?” Jim said.

So far they had dissected a worm and a cow’s eye. “Let’s just say I have no interest in becoming a doctor,” Sebastian laughed.

“No, you wouldn’t, would you? That involves putting things back together, and you’re more one to tear things apart,” Jim mused, almost admiringly.

Sebastian’s gaze shot up. “What do you mean by that?”

“ _Les personnes violentes sont faciles à détecter,_ ” Jim muttered. Violent people are easy to detect.

Sebastian automatically shot back, “ _Ce n'est pas si simple_ ,” before even realizing that Jim had spoken French.

Jim smiled at this, pleased, and Sebastian felt like he'd just entered some unspoken test, for next, Jim fired back in Italian, “ _E 'sempre così semplice_.” It’s always so simple.

There was a loud clatter from the front of the room as Phillip Channing slid from his chair and toppled to the floor in a dead faint. Sebastian couldn’t help bite back a laugh as Ms. Beauchamp muttered a curse under her breath and went over to help him. Miranda had lept up at once, Sebastian noticed, and was busy looking over Phillip. She immediately shucked off her sweater to bundle up behind his head. Sebastian could see the back of her bra through the white of her shirt. Jesus- what was wrong with him?

“ _Now, there is a doctor in the making. She wants to repair. You just laughed and sat back,”_ Jim said in Italian. “ _True nature is revealed in chaos._ ”

Sebastian sat in silence for a minute as he watched Miranda offer to get the nurse. Was Jim right about him?

“Right, Mr. Tempus, can you keep an eye on Mr. Channing until the nurse arrives? The rest of you may return to work.”

“You speak Italian rather well for an Irishman,” Sebastian said back to Jim in English, hastily trying to change the subject.

Jim actually smiled at this, something genuine, with actual delight. “ _It’s not as good as my Gaelic, I admit it. But with your surname you have no excuse for blaming heritage_ ... _Moran_ ,” he said in Gaelic.

Sebastian’s Gaelic was rusty, and his brain struggled to piece together the words, switching gears at a breakneck speed. It was a game of catch, languages flinging back and forth, and Moriarty was always throwing curveballs. Sebastian felt his mind sparking.

“ _How many languages do you know_?” He asked Jim, in Urdu this time. That ought to throw him.

And indeed, Jim blinked at him a moment before replying in a bit of a rougher pronunciation, “ _As many as I can fit in my head_ .” But it was in Urdu as well. Sebastian was blown away. Jim raised his eyebrow at Sebastian. “ _Hand me the…_ ” he gestured to the scalpel, evidently not knowing how to translate it to Urdu. Sebastian didn't either. He snapped back to attention, sliding the tool Jim's way.

“So...you really are a genius, then,” he said in awe, and in English once more.

Jim shrugged lightly. “You know at least ten languages yourself.” He took the scalpel and looked as if he was about to make the first cut, but after a moment he handed the knife to Sebastian. “After you,” he said, at least Sebastian thought it was what he said. Russian this time- not his strong suit.

“Mm. So, Italian, Gaelic, French, Urdu, Spanish, Russian-”

“My Spanish is conversational at best, and my Russian is shit.” Sebastian took the scalpel and cut through the middle of the pig, following the diagram. It smelled even worse sliced open. “Eurgh.”

“Mm. Did I miss anything?” Jim asked.

“Er, I speak Hindi quite well, and I know some Latin.”

“Ah. Useful for biology,” Jim said, taking the T-pins and pinning back the skin so they had a full view of the organs. He tsked and muttered in French, “ _So disappointing, when it's leeched of colour like these are. Dead things...why is life colourful and dead so...monotone_?” He gave one of the lungs a disheartened prod with the scalpel.

Sebastian wondered if Jim spoke in French because it was such a creepy sentiment and he didn’t want anyone overhearing. Then he remembered that Jim didn't seem to give a shit about what other people thought. Obviously, though, it was meant for Sebastian’s ears only, and that filled Sebastian with a certain measure of...was it pride? The thought disturbed him.

“ _Je ne sais pas_ ,” he said, and they both exchanged a quick smile.

They fell into silence, save for muttering about the general physiology and sharing notes. It was productive work, even with the distraction of poor Channing on the floor, who was soon helped out on a wheeled stretcher by the nurse, Miranda looking on in concern.

Sebastian and Jim’s silence felt less tense than the day before- one might even say companionable. It wasn’t until the bell rang that Sebastian realized aloud, “You know, I don’t believe you insulted me once today.”

Jim raised an eyebrow. His expression was unreadable, somewhere between critical and amused. “Why, are you keeping tally? You really are a vain creature. I suppose I wouldn’t expect any less from an ambassador’s son and an army brat.” He bundled up his books and brushed past Sebastian, headed for the door.

Sebastian hurried after him, seeing Jim dart the exact opposite way of the canteen. “Wait! Aren’t you going to lunch?” he called after him, but Jim was walking with a purpose, head bent, blocking the world out.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is all based on a madcap RP I did with the phenomenal mythylamycaptain. Also huge thanks to jonahandhiswhale for being my beta reader, and to friend_or_phantom for being my British beta, Brit-testing my story for accurate language and details. Any flubs on the Britishness are my own. ;) 
> 
> I plan on updating this fairly regularly (once or twice a week), so stay tuned for more! I hope you enjoy.


	2. First Date

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TWs: mention of animal torture/death, gay slurs, bullying

_What the hell am I doing here?  
I don't belong here._

_" **Creep"  - Radiohead (1993)**_

 

“Are you surviving?” Miranda asked as she and Sebastian walked their usual route to lunch.

“With Moriarty?” Sebastian laughed. Moriarty was by far the strangest boy he’d ever met, but he certainly wasn’t boring.“I think his bark is worse than his bite.”

Miranda frowned. “I wouldn’t be so sure about that.”

Sebastian asked what she meant, and she looked up at the ceiling, as if searching for words in the stained tiles there. “I told you we went to primary school together. Well, his mum -or maybe some other guardian- came to school, livid, and pulled Moriarty out of school. She made a big scene about him killing their dog. He acted completely innocent about it, but...I’d seen him...hurting animals on the playground the year before.”

She looked nervously at Sebastian, who nodded at her to continue. “There was this magpie with a broken wing. We’d found it, my friends and I, during recess. And we were debating if we should get an adult to try and help it, when _he_ came up...and he had this funny look in his eye, as if he’d hit the jackpot or something. All excited.”

Sebastian’s mouth was dry. “What did he do to it?”

Miranda didn’t meet Sebastian’s eye, staring down at the floor now as they walked. “He told us he’d take care of it for us. He’d been so quiet the whole year, hardly talking to anyone. But at that moment he was so sweet. His voice was so soft and gentle. So we let him alone...but then as we were lining up for the bell, there were these horrible, pained noises coming from behind the tree. Jim ran out to join the line last…and the next day, one of the boys found the magpie, all bent apart, and there was a sharp stick jabbed through its eye.”

She shuddered. Sebastian couldn’t tear his eyes off her, although he wasn’t at all thinking about her attractiveness now. “And what happened to the dog?” he asked quietly.

  
“Sebastian, it was sick. It was really sick, what he- I assume it was him, at least- did to that dog,” she said quietly, finally looking up at him. “I didn’t even want to know about it, but one of the boys lived in the neighborhood and saw it- it was lying on the front porch, all gutted open with flies buzzing around it…”

“I’m sorry I asked,” Sebastian said, moving to rub her back as they got to the canteen. He hated how it had upset Miranda, but he found himself sickly fascinated with Moriarty’s actions. Why had he done it? What had been going through his head?

They lingered outside the doorway, students hurrying past to get in line. “Are you going to the match tomorrow?” he asked, changing the subject. “I’d love it if you came. After all of Moriarty’s insults, my ego needs a boost,” he teased.

“Your ego needed deflating,” she grinned, rolling her eyes. “I can’t. Frankenstein rehearsals, remember? And did I mention how tiresome it is to pretend to die violently _every single night_?” She looked over at the table. “Besides, I don’t support that prick Carl Powers when I can help it. No offense. But good luck tomorrow, Sebastian.” She clasped his hand and gave it a slow squeeze, much to Sebastian’s surprise.

“Right- thanks...er...good luck at dying in rehearsal,” he said.

When he went to sit, he was still smiling, and Carl laughed harshly. “Awww, is Mr. Smooth all flustered about Miranda Whore-asquez? Cute.”

“Fuck off, Powers,” Sebastian muttered, looking around desperately for Barnes and Sundarum, but they were already in line for food.

Carl laughed again, moving to rub Sebastian’s shoulder with his broad swimmer’s hand. “Relax, mate. You know I’m just joking, right?”

Sebastian tensed under his hand. Powers’ ‘jokes’ were wearing increasingly thin.

“I’m starving,” he muttered, and hurried to join Barnes and Sundarum in the lunch line. They were busy talking about their maths teacher, Mr. Atkins.

“No, he _has_ to be a poof. No self-respecting straight man wears argyle sweaters in _those_ pastel shades off of a golf course,” Barnes laughed.

“Isn’t Mr. Atkins married, though?” Sebastian asked.

“That hardly means anything, Moran. Don’t be naive. Gay men get married all the time.”

“Well, there’s only one way we’d be able to know for sure,” Sundarum said.

“Yeah?” Sebastian asked.

They finished loading up their trays and headed back toward their table. “Yeah. Put Jim Moriarty in the room with him and see if they’d fuck.”

Sebastian’s stomach twisted unpleasantly. “What?”

“Oh, that’s right! You have biology with him, yeah?” Barnes said. “Well, this will come as no surprise, but he’s a complete faggot. It’s pretty fucking obvious.”

Sebastian said nothing, sitting down at the table.

Carl looked like it was his birthday. “Plus, we have concrete proof. I never told you about the time Moriarty came on to me, Basher?” he said.

Jesus, was this “Tell A Story About Moriarty Day”?

“Sure. Right,” Sebastian said, rolling his eyes and trying to cast if off as a joke. “If as many people came on to you as you said, Powers, you’d have dozens of girls hanging from your arms right now.”

Powers laughed mockingly. Sebastian hated his laugh- grating and harsh, and never friendly. “That’s a good one, Basher. Really funny. But it doesn’t change the fact that Moriarty tried to get off with me.”

Sebastian rolled his eyes. “Bollocks.”

“Mate, it’s true, I saw it happen,” Barnes said. “Jim was all handsy with him outside the locker room one night, and Powers was shoving him off.”

This gave Sebastian pause. Barnes wasn’t one to spin tales.

“What a freak,” Sundarum muttered.

“Tell me about it. I had to take a boiling hot shower just to get his gross little faggot fingerprints off me,” Powers smirked.

Sebastian was oddly silent for the rest of lunch, his stomach clenched in anger. There was no reason to be upset, he told himself. He was being upset over an animal torturer and a poof, he told himself.

But what would his mates at the table say about him, if they knew what had happened in France last year? Would they call Sebastian a faggot, too?

In France, Sebastian had befriended a schoolmate, Emile. Emile was shy and careful, with flawless brown skin and an infectious smile. He was one of the few friends that Sebastian actually missed, although he doubted Emile would ever talk to him again, not after the last time they’d been together.

Emile had stayed over at Sebastian’s while his parents were out at a late dinner. They’d raided his father’s liquor cabinet, pulling the old stuff from the back that he’d never miss, and a cheap bottle of wine. They’d gotten drunk together in the living room, listening to CDs- Sebastian’s Nirvana and Stone Temple Pilots, and Emile’s No Doubt and Blur - and making silly jokes.

After they were both drunk and giggly, Emile had leaned in and admitted that he was gay. Sebastian, even in his drunkenness, hadn’t known what to say. He’d never met a gay person before.

“I like you, Sebastian.” Emile’s dark hand had slid to Sebastian’s knee, and Sebastian had felt a prickle of warmth slide up his spine. “Have you ever kissed a boy before?”

Sebastian hadn’t. Emile had leaned closer, and then his full lips were on Sebastian’s. Kissing Emile wasn’t so different from kissing a girl, he told himself. Lips were lips. And he had been drunk, so of course it had felt nice. But when Emile’s hand crept further up his thigh, he had pulled back, then stumbled to his feet. “You should leave,” he’d muttered. “My parents will be back soon.”

“Okay. Sebastian, was that okay?” Emile had asked, and Sebastian could still see his face perfectly, the nervous apprehension written all over it.

“It’s fine. Just a mistake. I’m not- I don’t want to be- it’s fine that you are, but- you should go,” he’d fumbled.

He hadn’t even walked Emile home, and he should have- a mile walk home for a drunk, upset teenager in downtown Paris was no easy feat.

Emile had gotten home safely, because he rang Sebastian the next day, but Sebastian ignored his phone calls. It was awkward at school for a while, but Sebastian didn’t tell a soul about Emile, and a few months later, the _other thing_ had happened, and they’d moved back to London.

What did it mean that he’d kissed a boy? Nothing, he thought belligerently. He’d been drunk. It didn’t count.

“Oi, Moran! You coming?” Barnes shook his shoulder.

Sebastian snapped to attention. Everyone was rushing off to class, the next wave of students beginning to enter for their lunch time. “Yeah-” Sebastian muttered, looking down at his tray of food, which he’d been too distracted to touch. “I’m fine.”

__

After lunch was Latin, and then political science, and then a free block before rugby practice started. On rare occasions, Sebastian used the free block to steal into the bathroom for a quick wank (not that he was proud of it, but some days he felt insatiable), or out to the courtyard for a cigarette. More often, though, he would go into the library and read. He would squirrel himself away with books on language, military history, or anything he could get his hands on that looked halfway interesting.

Today was a library day. He pulled his CD player from his backpack, hitting play on the Garbage album inside and sliding his headphones on. He browsed the familiar shelves, finally settling on a book on the history of rifles. As he settled into a chair to thumb through it, he noted movement from the corner of his eye.

Moriarty was hefting a pile of books that had to weigh as much as he did. Sebastian gave him a brief nod of acknowledgement before returning to his book. He turned a page, idly adding to his mental wish list of guns he wanted to own someday.

Jim had settled across the way at a table. Sebastian had probably seen him here before, but he’d never paid him any attention. He had been so easy to overlook, but now that Sebastian had started noticing, he couldn’t seem to stop. Today, the Irish boy seemed to be reading solely about astronomy. He was becoming increasingly absorbed in a thick book, hunching closer and closer to the pages.

Sebastian must have been staring, because when Moriarty straightened to grab another book from his pile, he looked over at Sebastian and stared back, raising his eyebrows challengingly, waiting for Sebastian to back down.

 _Fuck you,_ Sebastian thought. _This isn’t your library. I’ll stare where I want._ Out of sheer stubbornness, he stared back, a brow rising. Moriarty didn’t even blink. Sebastian’s mouth nudged into a smile. A library showdown. How petty. How mortifyingly nerdy.

Jim’s face remained immobile. Weird fucking creature, he was. Sebastian thought of the magpie, and then the dog, and then the morbid thing Moriarty had said about fresh organs in class. A shiver ran down his spine, the dark thrill one got at a good horror movie. He finally conceded defeat, turning his attention to his book and adjusting his headphones.

When he looked up again, Jim and his mountain of books were gone.

__

The next morning, Sebastian had a handmade poster on his locker wishing him luck on the match. Instead of the usual “Crush St. Albans” or something similar, it said, in large, sparkly green letters, “Give St. Albans a worse existential crisis than Frankenstein’s creature.” He grinned. Miranda.

“Guilty,” she said when he confronted her after lab. “I never said I was good at catchy phrases.”

“I love it. I’m framing it,” Sebastian said. He bolstered up his courage. “When does your rehearsal end?”

__

By the end of the game, Sebastian was on cloud nine. Not only had they won the match, putting them into the tournament semifinals, but over lunch he had convinced Miranda to get a late dinner with him after the game.

He had to fend off thumps on the back and pressures to go out and party as he left the locker room. When he mentioned he had a date, there were various cheers and mocking “ooooos”, and Carl called out, “Don’t catch anything!” on Sebastian’s way out.

Miranda was waiting for him at the pizza place, her coat buttoned up against the windy October air. It was nearing the end of the month, and the cold wind blew the leaves off the trees, car wheels flinging them up on the sidewalks.

“Why’re you waiting outside?” Sebastian laughed, jogging up to her and opening up the door.

“You played a full game outside. I needed some fresh air as well,” Miranda grinned. She stepped in and tried to tame her hair.

“I hate the cold,” Sebastian admitted.

“Gosh, what are you doing in London?” she laughed.

They grabbed a seat and ordered, chatting away. Miranda liked to garden, Sebastian discovered, and even grew her own vegetables in the summer. She was torn between wanting to study theatre or medicine, so she was loading up on science and arts classes. Her dad was from Spain, and she had lots of stories about him embarrassing her friends. Sebastian hadn’t realized she spoke Spanish at home, so he eagerly dove into practicing his Spanish. She laughingly corrected some of his poorer pronunciations, and taught him how to “lisp” like a true Spaniard.

When they started talking languages, Miranda wanted to know everything about Sebastian’s years abroad, and so he told her- how when he was nine, they’d moved to Germany for a year, then India for over three, Pakistan for two, then eight months in France. He was worried he was dominating the conversation, but she was curious about it all.

“I want to travel,” she sighed wistfully. Sebastian felt a warm leap of joy when her foot slid to brush against his underneath the table.

“You’ve never been to Spain?”

“A couple of times, but it’s always just visiting family, so there’s not much actual traveling. We get herded along, take pictures in front of cathedrals, get a sunburn at the beach, and eat, eat, eat. But we always zip past the little theaters, the small cafes, the bookshops...I want to go exploring on my own, talk to strangers…But it’s out of the question. They want to do everything together. And Spaniards are _loud.”_ She grinned. “Come over for dinner some night, and you’ll see.”

Sebastian wondered if he was being asked out on a second date already. That would be fantastic. He wondered what it would be like to have an overbearing, involved family. His parents basically left him to his own devices, and he couldn’t remember the last time they’d all sat down and eaten as a family. When they did, it was because important guests were over, which meant a freshly-pressed suit for Sebastian, and good posture, and keeping his mouth shut unless asked a direct question.

“That sounds fantastic,” Sebastian said.

The waiter dropped off their cheque, and Sebastian promptly grabbed it. Would she want to go back home with him for a while? He’d never done a proper date before. He didn’t know how things were supposed to go. Powers’ words echoed in his head. _Don’t catch anything._ Arse.

“What’s wrong?” Miranda asked.

Sebastian realised he’d been frowning down at the table. “Nothing. Some garbage Powers told me,” he muttered.

It was the wrong thing to say. Miranda’s face closed off, and she looked away. “About me?” she asked.

“Miranda, I didn’t buy it, what he said. He’s always making shit up. I don’t know why I thought of it at all. Especially when this was going so well.”

Miranda looked around the busy restaurant. “Can we talk outside?”

He finished paying and they left. Miranda’s shoulders hunched up to avoid the cold, and Sebastian wrapped his arm around her as they walked down the street. The wind had died down, but they walked briskly toward the park. “Did something happen?” Sebastian asked.

Miranda took a deep breath. “Over the summer, Carl invited me a rugby party. Two of my other friends were going, so I came along. He...tried to get physical with me and I told him no. And so he’s been spreading that I’m a slut ever since,” she said quickly, as if trying to get it over with.

“That fucking bastard,” Sebastian seethed.

“It’s fine,” she said tersely. “I just don’t want to be around him. He makes me sick.”

“I’m going to fucking choke him,” Sebastian snarled.

“Sebastian-” Miranda’s voice was tense, and Sebastian realized his arm had tightened painfully around her shoulders.

“Sorry-” he said. He slid his hand down her back, moving to hold her hand. He gave it a light squeeze.

“Just promise you won’t make a big scene with him,” Miranda said. “It’s really not worth it. I know I did nothing wrong, and everything that comes out of his mouth is a vicious lie anyway, so who really buys it?”

Perhaps that was true...Sebastian hadn’t believed Carl, anyway. Did this mean the entire thing with Moriarty coming on to him was made up, too? He would hope, if nothing else, that Jim would have better taste.

Still, being told not to “make a scene” felt like a challenge to Sebastian, but he didn’t say so.  And anyway, he would be putting Miranda on the hook if he raised a fuss, not just himself. But he was done, he decided, pretending to be pals with Carl. “What a disgusting piece of human waste,” He muttered.

Miranda ran her thumb over Sebastian’s hand. “Not worth our mental energy,” she said, raising her chin.

He stopped walking and turned to her, his hands sliding to her waist. “Right. He shouldn’t spoil what was otherwise a rather fantastic first date.”

Miranda’s eyes widened. “Is that what this was? I thought we were just going as friends…”

Sebastian’s heart fell. “Oh…” he dropped his hands from her waist, his face burning. How had he misinterpreted that? And they’d just been holding hands-

“Sebastian, I’m kidding,” she laughed, pulling his hands back to her waist again, and walking him back until he was up against the nearby building’s wall. “School drama, remember?”

“You’re too convincing,” he laughed in relief, leaning in closer. “Or I’m too thick.”

“Maybe both.” She teased, her lips just an inch away, and Sebastian only had to tip his head slightly to close the gap, kissing her slowly.

She pressed against him, making a small noise as their kiss deepened. When they pulled away, Miranda smiled wider, glancing up at him.

He brushed his thumb over her cheek. “You’re rather fantastic, you know that?”

“If you’re trying to woo me with flattery, it’s working.” She kissed him again, and this time it was more heated, their bodies flush.  

When they drew away after a few minutes, Sebastian’s breath was faster. “Do you have time to come back to mine…? We could extend this date a bit longer.”

Miranda’s eyebrows raised. “Is that how things usually go for you? Bit fast, don’t you think?”

“We don’t have to do anything you’re not comfortable with,” he purred, his hand sliding down her hip. He heard her breath catch for a moment.

“Right. You’re not used to getting turned down, are you?” she asked, looking up at him.

“Not usually, no,” he grinned, catlike. “I think you’re absolutely gorgeous…”

She bit her lip, shifting. “I’ll be honest, Sebastian, I want to. A lot. But you have a reputation for…”

Sebastian was barely listening. All he’d heard was that Miranda wanted to have sex with him. He swelled with pride before the second part clicked in. “A reputation for what?”

“For...shagging girls and then dropping them cold,” she said in one breath.

“Oh.” Sebastian blinked. Is that why Isa Redford wasn’t talking to him? “It’s not like I’ve shagged a ton of girls. And we were just having fun. We knew it wasn’t serious when we got into it.” His face grew hot, his voice defensive. “If someone said something and took it the wrong way, that’s her problem, not mine.”

“I didn’t say you had a _problem,_ Sebastian, I just wanted to make it clear that I don’t want it to be some one time thing. I don’t want you to use me and then drop me.”

“I don’t want to use you and drop you,” he said, moving closer. Miranda held him back, a firm hand on his chest. Her face was clear, and he took a step back.

She took a deep breath. “So, I think we should-”

“Right…” Rejection. This was a rather new sensation. And painful.

“Go on a second date first. If you want,” Miranda finished.

Sebastian grinned, relieved. “Right. That, we can definitely do.” Never mind about his stupid “reputation.” Miranda wanted a second date with him.


	3. An Arrangement

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW for non-con

_Sometime, don't you feel like you  
Never really had a love that's real?_

**_"I Want Your Love" - CHIC (1978)_**

 

Jim Moriarty was plotting murder. He had almost figured out the best way to do it, too. There were a few holes to work out, but...yes, it was coming together. Beautifully. He closed his eyes, mentally unfurling the plan on a magnificent scroll. All of the threads would join together until he could pull them like marionette strings…

“Keep your eyes open, slut,” Powers’ voice barked, and Jim was forced back to the present.

He loathed game days. When the rugby league lost, Carl Powers fucked Jim with a violence that tipped from pleasure into sheer misery. When the rugby team won, as it had tonight, Carl wanted his ego- and other things- stroked, and was insatiable.

The only thing that kept Jim compliant was the fact that each of their meetings only dug Carl further into a shameful future. And some part of Carl knew that he was in too deep. How was a homophobe supposed to keep his social standing when he had a weakness for getting his cock sucked by a boy in the school locker room?

Carl was the only one who would have dared to fuck Jim Moriarty, and as much as Jim hated to admit it, his body had needs, needs that had only increased as he’d grown older, and among the clumsy and painful encounters were rare, transcendent moments when pain and pleasure met at a crossroads. These were the moments when Jim’s mind truly stilled for a few blissful seconds.

He never gave Carl the satisfaction of knowing this, however. He always tried to keep perfectly still during sex, wanting Carl to be as frustrated and unsatisfied as possible. Jim would very occasionally make his displeasure known, but he never begged, he never cried, and he never moaned or asked for more.

The pleasurable moments were few. Mostly there was sweat and grunting and pain, and then a mess. Sometimes two messes, but often just one. Jim took a small, personal delight in the fact that Carl was failing miserably at his main objective, which was to manipulate Jim into admitting defeat. It seemed a catch-22, but every time Jim agreed to meet Carl at the designated time and place, Carl lost just that much more. He was reasserting his sexuality every time, and Jim was collecting quite the library of encounters, some with audio, some with camera footage.

The business with Carl had started over the summer, about a month before school began. Jim never liked to be home, so he would sit in the shade of the trees behind the school, near the rugby pitch, and read. Sometimes he would stay until nighttime and try to stargaze, a mostly futile task in the light-polluted city.

Rugby practice had started in August, a few weeks before school began, and Jim would find his gaze drifting from his book to the shirtless rugby players’ bodies on hot afternoons. Their muscles would glisten with sweat in the sunshine, and Jim found the spectacle a pleasant distraction.

He preferred it this way, admiring men from a distance. He hadn’t had an attraction in anyone until a few years ago, when he’d seen some film where a muscular, shirtless man had been chained up and bloodied, and he’d found himself with a hard cock in the middle of his living room. He’d quickly covered it up with a pillow and had waited for it to go away. Later, he learned to deal with the itch in privacy. It seemed that he had a rather particular predilection, one that only increased as he grew older. It was something he could manage on his own- the idea of engaging with another human being was completely distasteful.

At some point, Carl had realized, as many others in school had, through some unknown combination of Jim’s soft voice, intense eyes, manner of walking, and clothing choices, that Jim was gay.

It had started with a pretense of blackmail, Carl cornering Jim after school and forcing him into the locker rooms to confront him. That entire plan had backfired; Jim had no friends, no reputation to protect. He’d laughed in Carl’s face and told him to tell the whole world, for all Jim cared.

That had earned him a punch so hard that his head rang, and then worse pain, far worse, when Carl seized Jim and had him over a changing bench.

Jim had fantasized about killing someone before, but he had never met a worthier target than Carl Powers.

He was patient, though. Carl continued to coerce Jim to meet with him, and Jim cooperated. He found ways to prepare ahead of time. He hated it, having to stretch himself and keep his own stock of lube and condoms, since Carl never bothered with either.

Yes, Jim was patient. Patient enough to scrap up enough money to buy the smallest battery-powered cassette deck he could afford, stowing it in his rucksack before their meetings.

He would listen to the tapes later, taping over parts where Powers grunted out his name. No need to have himself outed in this whole mess. It was always a risk. He didn’t know what Powers would do if he discovered that Jim was recording their little meetings. But it would all be worth it, when Powers died in disgrace.

That’s what Jim told himself now, as Carl pushed Jim’s head deeper to swallow more of his cock. Jim had done this so many times that he could tune the whole encounter out and still do a good job. He let his head wander to something more pleasant...but instead of his intricate plans, Sebastian Moran popped into his head.

Sebastian Moran, the athlete with the blond hair that fell in front of his eyes when he was bisecting a pig lung. What would he look like, bent over a table, or splayed out on the floor, having his cock sucked? Those silver eyes widening in shock, that strong jaw falling slack.

He was an intriguing character, that Moran. At first Jim had completely written him off- he was too pretty. He’d felt an immediate aversion to him the moment he’d swanned in at the beginning of the year. He’d stank of money and travel stories, making girls’ (and some closeted boys’) heads turn as he walked confidently down the halls, as if he owned the school.

Then again...perhaps not a bad person to have on his side. He was handsome, strong, good with languages, and miraculously, he didn’t seem completely repulsed by Jim. Moran might prove useful to him yet.

“F-fuck. Gonna finish-” Carl choked out, fisting Jim’s hair.

You’ll be finished soon, Carl, Jim thought to himself. Idiot. Trusting your most vulnerable organ in the mouth of someone who has your utter destruction planned… The thought was so comforting that Jim didn’t even mind swallowing this time.

Usually Carl let Jim go after he’d come, but this time, he dragged Jim close, his hot breath cloying against Jim’s cheek. “There’s a good boy.”

“I’m not good,” Jim said, eyes blazing as he looked up at him.

“Ooo, touchy. You were off in a little wet dream of your own there...dreaming about Sebastian Moran?” he sneered.

Jim pushed him away, moving to drag his trousers back on. Carl looked pathetic as he was, half-undressed, still in his rugby clothes, splayed out against the locker room bench. “What the fuck are you talking about?” Jim asked. He would have to tape over this part of the conversation. He was also furious at himself for being so obvious.

“I know you’re lab partners with him,” Carl said. “Bet you enjoy getting so close with that muscular body of his.”

Jim rolled his eyes. “Don’t you think you’re projecting, Powers?”

In a flash, Powers had yanked his rugby shorts up and slammed Jim against the lockers, his hands closing around his wrists to pin them against the metal. “My mate Duncan said you two are getting quite cozy in biology lab. Mooning over each other over a dead fucking pig.” He grabbed Jim’s face. “Don’t pretend like you deserve to have friends. He doesn’t actually like you. Nobody could ever actually like you.”

Jim stared back at him, his dark eyes fathomless. “And what does that say about you, that I’m the only one who would dare to get near that filthy cock of yours?”

Jim knew he would pay for that comment, and he did, but the fury on Carl’s face was worth the harsh blow to his stomach that made him cough and crumple on the concrete floor.

“See you Monday.” Powers stepped over Jim and left the locker room.  
___

Moriarty had bruises on his wrists. Sebastian noticed them when he returned to biology lab on Monday. Jim’s uniform jumper was a size too large, and sagged over his wrists, but Sebastian caught sight of the purplish splotches when Jim was reaching for his notebook.

Sebastian caught his wrist carefully. The bruises were clearly indents of a thumb and fingers. “Jesus. Are you okay?”

Jim yanked his arm away from Sebastian’s touch with sudden violence. “I’m fine,” he snapped.

“Easy…” Sebastian’s voice was soft.

Jim’s eyes narrowed. Moran had obviously had a marvelous weekend- probably with that Velasquez girl, since they kept glancing over at each other and grinning like typical idiot teenagers.

“Stop trying to pretend that we’re friends, Sebastian. We’re not. You have your friends, and I have…” Jim paused, then spat out, “Me.”

“Have any of them ever done anything to you? Or do you just harass them for no reason, like you do to me?” Sebastian snapped back, quietly furious.

Jim’s face went white, and he pressed his mouth shut. There was no acidic comeback for once. Instead, he worked the rest of the class in silence, wholly ignoring Sebastian and taking painstaking precautions to make sure that their hands wouldn’t so much as accidentally brush. The chatter around them only made their table seem that much more deathly quiet. Jim kept his sleeves firmly over his wrists for the rest of class.

It was only when the bell rang that he leaned toward Sebastian and hissed in German, “I know things about your so-called friends that would make you throw up.”

Then he grabbed his books and fled.

This time, though, Sebastian followed him, brushing past Miranda with a terse “talk later”, making a beeline after Jim.

God, he was quick- and small, brushing through the swarms of students with ease. Sebastian lost sight of him several times, but managed to see him dart around the corner toward the art wing.

He didn't dare call out, worried that Jim would only evade him further- and he was oddly curious to see what exactly Jim got up to during the lunch break.

Jim slipped into a classroom, and Sebastian slowed, moving quietly up to peer through the door’s little rectangular window.

The classroom was empty, save for Jim, who moved to uncover a large canvas. He hummed to himself - Sebastian could hear the muffled noise through the door- then went over to the classroom’s boombox and put in a cassette. A disco beat came out, and Jim began prepping his paints. Sebastian couldn't quite see the artwork, but Jim was soon lost in his work, singing along to the tune.

Sebastian didn’t know what he’d expected, but it hadn’t been this. As if in a trance, he opened the door and drifted inside. Jim had his back to him, but as Sebastian rounded toward him, he got a full view of Jim’s painting.

It was breathtaking. It seemed to show an epic battle between good and evil, and in the center a body was gutted open, its organs rendered in high detail and vivid colours- a living body sliced open, unsettling and gorgeous. Its limbs, organs, and muscles were threaded through with strands of light and darkness that snaked out into the surrounding picture.

How could one picture evoke so many different feelings? Sebastian felt revulsion and discomfort mixed with complete awe. He had never had such a reaction to a piece of art before, and here was 15-year-old Moriarty, painting away at some abstract details in the corner.

Before he could think of a way to make his presence known without startling the artist, Jim spoke up without turning around. “Have you come to mock me?” he asked.

“No-” Sebastian said automatically, a bit breathless. “Did you really paint all of this?”

It was a stupid question, and he knew it was as he heard himself say it. Who else could have done this?

“Mm.” Jim set down his brush and turned in his stool to look at him. The disco music still blared. Sebastian actually knew this song.

I want your love, I want your love...

“I don’t do art often. Only when an idea strikes. Ms. Leasher is kind enough to let me use her art room when she doesn’t have classes.”

“Is Ms. Leasher the one with the CHIC tapes?” Sebastian asked, swaying his hips in a mocking fashion to the rhythm.

Jim’s mouth twitched up into a smile. “Just so. Judging by her selection, she graduated uni in 1978 or 1979.”

“Is that how you figure out things about people? By their music collections?” Sebastian dragged over a chair, sitting in it backwards. He studied Jim almost as intently as he had the painting.

“What do you mean?” Jim frowned at him. He picked up his paintbrush once more, dabbing it with blue and purple paint in a casual way that borderlined on careless, then began using quick, deft strokes on the lower edge of the canvas.

“You knew all that stuff about me right away,” Sebastian said. “That my mum was an ambassador and my dad was a brigadier..”

Jim grinned at him. “Oh, come now, I didn’t know his official rank. Cheers for the volunteered information, though.” He clucked his tongue, than gave Sebastian a look that bordered on sultry. “I pay attention to everything. Music collections, how people dress. What they say. What their faces say and their mouths don’t.”

Sebastian felt his face growing hot. All of their little exchanges in class, and now that look...was Jim flirting with him? Or just messing with him? It was impossible to tell.

“I’m bad at reading people, I guess, because I haven’t a clue what’s going on with you,” Sebastian admitted with a little chuckle, pushing back his hair.

“You’re trying to decide if you believe what everyone says,” Jim said blandly, then caught sight of Sebastian’s expression and scoffed impatiently. “You’re either shagging or dating Miranda, and the concerned glances she throws us in biology haven’t escaped me.” He glared at his painting. “Her fear of me borders on pity. Intolerable.”

“She said you tortured a bird and killed a dog,” Sebastian blurted out.

Jim look at him mildly, his thin eyebrows arching. His eyes were black, endless. “What if I had, Moran? Would you run away? Would you skirt around me fearfully, avoid me in the hallways?”

“Why would you do that?” Sebastian asked, avoiding his question, partially because he didn’t know, or want to know, the answer.

“I wanted to understand things, and those animals served a particular purpose to me.”

“Yeah, but...it was your pet dog, Jim!” Sebastian spluttered.

“I never said I was ordinary, Sebastian,” he said silkily. “Surely you’ve dreamed of what it would be like to kill something...or someone?”

“But-” Sebastian realized that Jim was right. When he had been young, he had begged his father for stories about the wars: “Did you kill anyone? What was it like? Were you up close or far away?”

August Moran had always cut these stories short, but Sebastian wanted desperately to understand. That was the ultimate power, after all, being able to shut off someone’s life completely, irrevocably. He couldn’t reconcile the idea with the real thing. They would go to Shakespeare plays when he was young, and actors would fall down, dead, run through by swords or poisoned or choked. Then they would show up for curtain call, alive and smiling and bowing to the applause. What was real death like? Sebastian had thirsted to know.

“But-” Sebastian started again. “It’s wrong,” he finished lamely.

Jim gave a sharp, dry laugh, cleaning his brush and dabbing at another colour. “Is that why you trotted after me? To moralize me? Don’t be boring, Moran.” There was a hint of a plea behind his usual bored tone. Please don’t be boring, he seemed to be saying. For once.

“No- I came to ask what you meant. You can’t just dangle information about my teammates then run off,” Sebastian said.

Jim sneered. “Now, now, Moran. We can’t have you picking fights with your friends, not before your big championship!”

“I wouldn’t exactly call any of the blokes on my team ‘friends,’” Sebastian said. “We eat lunch together, and we play rugby together….but they’re a means to an end.”

Jim laughed in delight. “Oh, see, I knew you had potential,” he said, then his face soured. “Still..some people are hardly even worth manipulating.”

Sebastian couldn’t remember the last time he’d kept his gaze so intensely focused on a person’s face. When he was around Jim, he couldn’t tear his eyes away. His moods and expressions changed so quickly, like clouds skirting across a sky on a windy day.

“I assume that you’re talking about Powers, because yeah, he’s an all-out, lying prick,” Sebastian said casually. “And a bully.”

Jim’s expression was unreadable, his face darkened. He stared directly at- or into- Sebastian, but then broke the contact, eyes flicking to his painting. “What did he tell you about me?”

Sebastian reddened, embarrassed at repeating it, but he told Jim what Carl had said.

“And what did you think?” Jim asked, holding Sebastian with his gaze.

“I- I thought you had shit taste in men, if the story was true,” Sebastian said.

Jim grinned, but there was something achingly sad about it. The smile fell off abruptly, though, and he released a long, dramatic sigh. “My painting is being shown at the Kitchener Gallery at the end of the month. It will be under an anonymous name, but I’ll be there for the artists’ reception. If you wished to come,” he said, the last sentence muttered so that it was almost unintelligible.

Sebastian was taken aback by the offer. “I’d love to.”

Jim looked almost bashful for a moment, before his face turned ferocious and intense. “It’s a very formal reception. They don’t let any old riffraff in, of course, so you’d need to dress nicely. And I don’t want anyone else coming. So please leave your girlfriend at home,” he said with a borderline sneer.

“She’s not my girlfriend,” Sebastian said. Yet. “But point taken. I won’t tell anyone.”

Jim stared at him, unblinking. “Promise me.”

“I promise, Jim.”

Jim continued to stare, cracking his neck slightly to one side. Sebastian noticed a fleck of paint on the edge of his nose. “Go on, then. I need to work.”

“Good luck,” Sebastian said, rising. He didn’t realize until he had left the classroom that he had obeyed Jim’s commands effortlessly. It was the confidence in his voice. Even in his oversize jumper and with paint on his face, he was as imposing as a king on a throne. Sebastian shivered. How could a fifteen year old boy with no friends exude so much power? And what did he intend to do with it?


	4. Strategy

_I don't understand how the last card is played,  
But somehow the vital connection is made._

**_"Connection" - Elastica (1995)_**

 

_November, 1995_

After Sebastian’s confrontation with Jim in the art room, Jim had been different around him. He’d grown quieter and more reserved, but he’d also stopped hurling insults at Sebastian. The next couple of weeks went by without incident, each biology session passing with relatively little fuss - save for the fact that Sebastian was rather distracted with Miranda.

They’d slept together a week after their third date, when Sebastian had brought her home to “study” in his bedroom, and now Sebastian couldn’t get enough. Neither could Miranda- she kept looking back at him in lab, making him blush and fumble with his equipment. Jim said nothing, but he would grow stiff and defensive, muttering at Sebastian to pay attention, for God’s sake, and not to ruin anything.

Despite that nice distraction, everything else was going well. The rugby team was getting ready for the tournament semifinals, up against the team they’d lost against the year before: Birchwood Academy.

At practice that week, Sebastian decided to try and ramp spirits up.

“Right, huddle in, everyone.” The rugby team circled around Sebastian. “We have just three practice sessions until the game. That means we need to be strategic for every last practice.

“Tanner, I want you focusing on racking up as many points as possible in the first half of the game. From what I’ve discovered about Birchwood, they have outstanding defense this year, so we’ll need to put our best foot forward early. Oy, Powers! Pay attention,” he snapped as Carl muttered something to his friend Anthony Littleman in the back of the cluster.

Sebastian’s voice was more curt than usual; Powers had become increasingly snide over the last few practices.

“Excellent, Moran,” Coach Turnow said, stepping in. “Today we’ll be doing speed and reflex drills before scrimmage. Moran, take them onto the field.”

Sebastian nodded, trying to ignore it when he heard Powers loudly mutter, “It’s big of Moran to talk about strategy against Birchwood when he didn’t even _play_ them last year.”

Still, every player was especially focused during the drills and the scrimmage. Coach was in high spirits when he called the players in toward the locker room, and the positive energy in the room was contagious.

“We’re going to fucking slaughter Birchwood!” Barnes crowed, clapping Sebastian on the shoulder room. “Moran, did you see Powers’s tackle?”

“Yeah- good work, Powers. Just don’t batter any of your teammates up before the match,” he said in an amiable way. Or tried to.

Powers glared at him. “Thanks, _oh captain my captain,_ ” he all but sneered.

Sebastian gave him a sarcastic thumbs-up, then opened up his locker. A folded up note fell out, and he hastily caught it. On the outside was scrawled, “Open when alone.”

Sebastian frowned. Was that Jim’s handwriting?

“Oh, mate, I forgot to tell you,” Barnes said, tapping him on the shoulder. Sebastian hastily tucked the note under his shoes and turned. “Sundarum’s cousin is letting us party in his flat after the Birchwood game. You can come, right?”

“Yeah, definitely.” Sebastian tugged off his sweaty shirt.

“Right. Invite Velasquez if you want. And bring beer if you can.”

“Well, that goes without saying,” Sebastian laughed, grabbing his towel. He finished shedding his clothes and hopped in the shower.

He closed his eyes, tipping his head back under the water. Was the note actually from Jim? If so, what was he doing, skulking around the locker room during practice?

Powers sauntered into the showers, boldly standing directly opposite Sebastian. There were unspoken rules about the showers- nobody wanted to come off as body shy, but nobody wanted to come off as queer either, so showering side by side or with backs to each other was the norm. Nobody just _stared_ like Carl was doing.

“Oy, stop, you fucking poof,” Sebastian said automatically, turning his back. He didn’t like his eyes on him. Sure, it was normal to size others up in the showers- just brief, embarrassed glances, if only to make sure your own body wasn’t secretly a freak of nature.

“That’s rich. You calling _me_ a poof,” Powers said under his breath.

Sebastian looked over his shoulder. “What the fuck did you just say?” he snarled.

Powers grinned, making no motions to cover himself up or take up a more modest pose. “You know what I said,” his voice dropping lower.

Sebastian turned back around, muttering a “fuck off” and becoming more hurried with his washing up. He felt a wave of paranoia, thinking back to moments- because there had been moments, however brief- when his gaze had slid over one of his teammates’ for just a second too long. He could appreciate the male body without being gay. Of course he could. Tanner objectively had a nice back. And backside. That was just an aesthetic fact. His face burned, fury at Power threatening to boil over.

“You know, Powers, for not being gay, you certainly talk about it a lot,” he finally snapped, but when he turned around, Powers had already left. He cursed and smacked the tile wall, making his hand smart. Idiot.

Did other teammates think he was gay? How could they? They knew he’d already hooked up with Kari, and that he and Miranda were dating.

He wrapped himself in his towel, and quickly dried off and changed, making sure to keep his gaze stoic and straight ahead at his locker. The folded note was still there under his shoes. He hastily pocketed it before tossing on his sweatshirt. Powers had already left, thank God.

Barnes sidled up to him. “All right, mate?”

“Yeah. M’fine…” Sebastian mumbled.

“Did Powers get to you? Don’t pay him any mind. He’s been childish about you sitting with Velasquez every day at lunch.”

Ever since finding out what Carl had done to Miranda, Sebastian had been sitting at Miranda’s lunch table. He’d faced the inevitable chiding: “She’s got you whipped!” “Thinking with your cock again, Moran?”  But it was worth it to avoid Powers’ leer.

“Childish is right. She’s my girlfriend.”

Barnes moved in a bit closer, his voice lowering, and for a moment, Sebastian was worried that he was going to grill Sebastian about his sexuality. _Mate, the boys and I know that this is all just an act. Carl told us all about you._

But instead he asked, “How do you do it, Moran? I don’t fucking _get_ it. You just transferred here, for God’s sake.”

Sebastian fingered the note in his pocket, antsy to read it, but he heard the edge of jealousy in Barnes’ voice, the frustration. Out of all of his teammates, Barnes had been the most solid. He’d loaned Sebastian bus fare when his dad hadn’t showed up to pick him up from their first game of the season, he’d put in a good word for Sebastian to be captain, even though there was resentment at his being a newcomer, and he was genuinely friendly toward him.

So Sebastian sat down on the changing bench, repressing a bit of a sigh. “Who are you so interested in, Toby?”

Barnes blushed from his neck up to his ears. “Sylvia Wool,” he said finally.

“Oh, right. She’s fit, yeah,” Sebastian said.

“Yeah, she is. And she’s nice, and I made her laugh...I just don’t get how it’s so easy for you, mate. If I’m being honest, it’s really bloody frustrating,” he muttered, sitting next to Sebastian, but keeping a healthy distance between them.

Sebastian wished he had any sort of advice, but honestly, he’d never really faced rejection before. “Well...you made her laugh, right? Seems a good sign to me. Just don’t try too hard, yeah? It comes off as desperate. Even if you’re not,” he hurriedly added.

“Hah,” Barnes said with a frustrated little laugh. “Right. I’m going to be single till I’m forty.”

Sebastian laughed. “Bit early days to be predicting that, don’t you think? Besides, relationships are overrated.”

Barnes, the virgin, blushed, and was silent a bit longer. “Have you ever been in love, Sebastian?”

“No,” Sebastian said. “At least, I don’t think so.”

Barnes laughed somewhat hollowly and grabbed his sports bag. “Is it sad that that sort of comforts me?”

Sebastian only shrugged, his hand slipping into his pocket to curl over the note.

“You hungry? Sundarum and I talked about getting kebabs.”

Sebastian’s thumb brushed the folded note’s corner, working a dent into his flesh with the folded paper. “I would, but I have to get home,” he said.

“Right. Oh, and Basher? Could you...not mention this to the other blokes?”

“No worries, mate. Take care.”

It wasn’t until Sebastian was safely on the bus home and settled into the backseat, headphones in, that he opened the note. It was definitely Jim’s handwriting- that mad, spider scrawl. The text filled the entire notebook sheet. At first it looked like gibberish, but as Sebastian read, he saw it was a painstakingly-researched rugby match strategy. On the right-hand side were hand-drawn columns with statistics for seemingly every Birchwood rugby player. Not just numbers, but bullet lists of strengths and weaknesses, going as far in as psychological profiles.

“Jesus Fucking Christ,” Sebastian muttered to himself, earning a scornful look from the kerchief-wearing nanna across the aisle.

If this was real, then this was the result of a staggering amount of research. It would also be insurmountably valuable. The lefthand side of the page laid out a detailed strategy, taking every player from both team into account.

Sebastian’s heart sped up as he flipped the page over. Holy fucking hell. Jim had scribbled out every St. Cuthbert player’s statistics as well, including Sebastian’s.

On one piece of notebook paper, Jim Moriarty, who sneered at sports and regarded Sebastian with disdain, had laid out a perfectly logical and brilliant playbook that would ensure St. Cuthbert a victory on Friday.

___

In biology, they were nearly done with the dissections. Along with observing the entire digestive system, they had done detailed examinations of the lungs, liver, and brain, and were now on to the final lab assignment, the heart. At their next lab, Sebastian leaned towards Jim and murmured in Italian, “ _Thank you for the strategy. It’s incredible._ ”

Jim looked up from the heart and stared at him with a flat, unimpressed expression. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he said stonily in English.

Sebastian had the strategy in his pocket, and he slipped it out just enough for Jim to see. “This is your handwriting,” he insisted. “Don’t tell me it’s not. Who else would do it?”

“I didn’t write whatever the hell that is, Moran,” Jim said icily. “Do you really think I would waste my valuable time on a _sport strategy_? I think you wrote it yourself. And I think it would be smart to hide it away and stop blathering on about it. Now take a look at this aorta. Does it look deformed to you?”

Ah. So Jim was purposefully not claiming ownership. His glance slid to Jim’s lab worksheet. Jim hadn’t even tried to disguise his handwriting on the strategy notes. Still, there must be a reason why. Did he really want Sebastian to take credit for it all?

“Nobody would believe you anyway, Sebastian, and it would only cause trouble if they did,” Jim murmured under his breath, carefully slicing open the left ventricle.

Sebastian opened and closed his mouth, unnerved by how Jim seemed to read his mind. He leaned in toward the heart, his forehead almost brushing against Jim’s hair as he muttered, “Why are you helping me?”

Jim didn’t pull back. “ _Why does anyone do anything?_ ” Jim said in Italian. “ _Because I’m bored_.”

And that ended the conversation. They worked the rest of the lab in easy silence. Sebastian was finding it easier to be in Jim’s company. He was beginning to anticipate when Jim wanted to be left alone to observe for himself, and when he wanted Sebastian’s help. He began fetching tools for Jim before Jim even asked, and the marginal extra effort it took was worth the tiny smiles that would twitch at Jim’s lips.

He realised, with some discomfort, that ever since that day in the art room, he had been aching to make Jim smile- a genuine one, not the mocking grimaces he threw out on a regular basis. Sebastian didn’t want to think too hard about what that could mean, so the two worked the rest of the lab in efficient silence, and finished their heart segment before any other group.

“I’ll write the final report tonight,” Jim said.

“Oh- we can share responsibility on that,” Sebastian said, uneasy about letting Jim take on all the work. “And anyway, it’s not due till next week.”

Jim only rolled his eyes. “Please. It will take me five seconds and we’ll get a perfect score. Besides, don’t you have an important game to worry about?”

___

At the beginning of their final practice before the game, Sebastian gathered up the team, ready to share the new plan.

In between classes, Sebastian had run to the library to type out Jim’s notes on a computer, printing out a copy for everyone. He was in such a rush that he had been late for Latin class, sprinting down the hall while juggling notes and print-outs.

It was all worth it, though, to see his teammates’ faces.

“Holy shit,” Sundarum muttered, looking over the printed strategy. “Moran, where’d you get this? Statistics...personal profiles?”

“You’d be amazed what you can learn from Hull’s local papers,” Sebastian grinned.

Everyone was looking over the notes, nodding and chattering to each other. Only Carl Powers was looking upwards at Sebastian, staring him square in the eye with an unsettling expression.  
  
“So- let’s give the new strategy a go!” Sebastian said.

“Why are we changing it last minute?” Powers said, too loudly.

All heads turned to look at him.

Sebastian blinked, keeping his voice mild, though his hands balled into fists. “Because I found new data,” he said. “We need to use what we know to our advantage. And we know more now.”

“Right. Enough talk, let’s do this!” Barnes said, getting off the bench and rallying the others out.

“Well, done, Moran!” Coach Turnow agreed. “Thinking on your feet - that’s what I like to see! Everyone out, let’s start with speed drills!”

Powers lingered behind, cornering Sebastian before he could join his teammates. “Isn’t is just so convenient that you just happened to ‘research’ a day before the match,” he sneered.

“I suppose so, Powers. Now let’s get out there. We have work to do,” Sebastian said, but Carl grabbed his arm, forcing him back against the lockers. “What the fuck- GET OFF ME.” Sebastian was strong, but Carl was stronger, and Sebastian could barely budge under his grip.

“Only I know that you didn’t write those plans, did you?” Carl said.

Carl’s fingers dug into his wrist painfully. How could he possibly know about the strategy? “Powers, I swear to God-”

“What are you going to do? Tell coach that I hurt your little arm? Do that, and I’ll tell the whole team that you’re a fake, that you’re using Jim Moriarty’s strategy to make yourself look good. Fucking pathetic.”

“Jim Moriarty? Where the fuck did you get that idea?” Sebastian snarled.

“‘Open when alone,’” Powers grinned mirthlessly. “That’s so cute...Moriarty trying to be all covert, folding up some sports data as if it were love poetry.”

“How did you-?”

Carl’s fingers closed on Sebastian’s wrist so hard that Sebastian’s knees buckled from the pain. “You dropped a little something in the library when you were busy typing.” His free hand pulled out Jim’s note. _Fuck._ Sebastian must have dropped it somewhere in the shuffle of printing pages and darting off to Latin.

“Isn’t it nice that I rescued it for you? I know _exactly_ what Moriarty’s handwriting looks like. I bet you fucked him in exchange, hm?” Carl’s voice had dropped to an intimate purr. He seemed to relish the ragged, pained breaths Sebastian was taking. “Is that right? You got him off in exchange for looking like the wise, undefeatable captain?”

“What the fuck is your problem?” Sebastian snarled, beginning to panic. He began to push back with all of his remaining strength, and when Carl’s foot slipped, he took his opportunity and had enough space to kick at his shin and shove him off.

Carl swore, grabbing his shin. He rounded on Sebastian, who was backing hurriedly toward the door.

“They’re for the good of the team, and he gave them to me because he _felt_ like it,” Sebastian snarled. “So fall in or get the hell off the team.”

Carl swore, grabbing his shin, but when he looked up, he was laughing mockingly. “Of course. It’s all for the good of the team,” he smirked. “Well, good luck with that.”

He shoved past Sebastian and went out onto the pitch. Sebastian shook out his wrist, coming out after him. He was so pissed he couldn’t even think straight. Powers was already joking around with Barnes and Sundarum. Nobody seemed to see the truth - that Carl Powers was a fucking monster.

 


	5. Betrayal

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW for rape, abuse, mention of animal death

_I'm so happy because today_  
_I've found my friends_  
 _They're in my head_  
 _I'm so ugly, but that's okay, 'cause so are you._

**_"Lithium" - Nirvana (1995)_**

 

Sebastian was beginning to bend, and he didn’t even realise it. Jim smiled to himself as he lay in bed that night.

He thought back to class. Sebastian had been pleased with his little notes. Well, of course he had been. They were impressive. During his outdoor reading stints, he would do more than admire the athletic bodies when he bothered to look up from his book on astronomy or economics or history, or whatever interesting kernel he’d managed to find amongst the teenage-gear pap in the school library. He would study the game, and the players.

Rugby was a brutish sport, an outlet for teenage boys who had dangerous levels of testosterone. Better than actual fights, adults would say when people criticized the sport’s violence. Jim knew the truth, though. It would be better to let the boys fight with guns or knives. The stupid ones would be killed faster, and it would be so much more entertaining to watch. All of humanity would thank him, in the end.

Still. The game did have its values; it scratched some primal itch. For a while, Sebastian Moran was just another pretty body on the field, all muscle and reflexes and animal grunts. Something to store away for later, on nights when it was too loud or too cold in the council flat to sleep. Like tonight.

Since becoming his lab partner, Sebastian Moran had taken on a whole new flavor. A piece of muscle that knew how to kneel. Now that was something truly desirable.

Jim closed his eyes, blocking out the shouting from downstairs. He imagined Sebastian with a gun in his hand. He imagined Sebastian with a knife pressed to his throat. He imagined Sebastian naked, and it was surprisingly easy to conjure up what his body might be like.

Jim swallowed, his hand drifting over his stomach, and then lower, under his pants and around his cock. It was funny, he thought. Until Sebastian had come along, Jim had never fantasized about a real person before.

In his mind, Jim had a room all to himself, where he could do whatever he liked. He could strip Sebastian and pin him down or chain him up to learn his body. He could make him plead and beg, make him scream from pain, make him feel so good that he fell in love with him. And Jim would always have the upper hand and a loyal guard dog. God. Yes. His hand worked faster. “‘Bastian-” The name tumbled loosely from his lips, and Jim came harder than he had a right to, panting against his thin pillow. He could feel his heart drum. Sebastian bloody Moran.

“Don’t lose yourself,” Jim whispered to yourself. Having carnal feelings was one thing, but when emotions got attached to them… well, Jim had to keep feelings out of the way entirely. It was already getting out of hand. He and Sebastian were dangerously close to becoming “friends.”

And Powers was already becoming suspicious. Jim knew he would have to see Powers after practice the next day.

It was no coincidence that the strategy used Powers as little as possible. Jim was sick of Powers prattling on about how the team would be “nothing” without him. Jim wanted to put that theory to the test. And with his calculations, he had proven Carl wrong already - if the team used the strategy and put in effort, they would trounce the other team, and with minimal help from Powers.

He anticipated that Sebastian would take some heat for that little move, but he was sure Sebastian could hold his own. And anyway, Carl couldn’t ever do to Sebastian what he did to Jim. Moran had too much social collateral.

Jim knew that Sebastian had shared the plan as soon as Carl met him at their usual spot in the darkened locker rooms.

“You little son of a whore,” he snarled, grabbing Jim and throwing him to the ground. Jim had developed a technique for catching himself on the concrete to prevent breaks and minimize bruising.

“Hello to you too, Carl, dear,” Jim sing-songed, his eyes dull.

Carl wasn’t wasting any time tonight. He was already dragging Jim’s trousers down, which hung loosely on his hips anyway. He pressed Jim’s knees up to his chest. “I hope you prepped yourself today, because I’m not fucking waiting.” He yanked his own fly open.

Of course Jim had prepped himself. He always did when he knew that Carl would be demanding his time...he was almost considering doing it every day, since Carl had caught him off-guard one night, and the pain had been worse than anything Jim had ever experienced. He _loved_ pain. It made him feel alive. But that had been beyond what he could possibly enjoy, and it had been incredibly inconvenient, having to staunch the bleeding over the next week to avoid staining his trousers.

Jim’s love of pain did come in handy- he was delighted at Carl’s frustration when Carl first tried to hurt Jim and got a positive response from him. Carl had now learned to reserve slaps across the face and hair-pulling for rewards instead of punishments, but sometimes he got so frustrated he hurt Jim anyway, and Jim would give a theatrical moan that would only have fit in the most over-the-top porno, or he would laugh in Carl’s face. He always payed, but it was always worth it.

Now, though, Jim knew enough to keep from mocking Carl or pushing stubbornly against him. Carl’s touch was rough and furious. He laughed in Jim’s face as he pushed into him, mirthless. That was the very worst- when Carl laughed at him. Even when Jim _knew_ he was better than him, when he _knew_ that Carl was pathetic and would pay, that grating, mocking laugh dug under his skin and made Jim furious.  

“Look at you, prepped and lubed like a little slut,” he said viciously, starting up his thrusting rhythm almost immediately. Jim’s body couldn’t remain unresponsive to the movements, but he did his best to stay still, holding on to his thighs and staring up at Carl as steadily as he could, his mouth drawn into a tight line.

“I saw you lurking by the pitch today,” Powers said, and it was almost conversational, if not for the heavy puffs of air as he drove into Jim.

Jim said nothing. He would not respond. He would be a statue.

“Mooning after Basher?” Carl sneered, giving a hard thrust that made Jim bite down on his lip.

 _Weak_ , Jim chided himself. He was being weak.

He forced a manic grin. “You just- can’t let that one go, can you?” Jim laughed a bit breathlessly. “Well - get stuffed. He’s just another idiotic- athlete-”

Carl’s large hand pushed down on Jim’s face, forcing it against the floor. “Liar,” he snarled. “I saw the strategies you wrote. It’s cute, how much- effort you put into them- You must be in love with the boy.”

Jim’s eyes widened. After everything...Sebastian had shown them to him? Why? Why would he do that? His mind whirred frantically. Everything he thought of as a conceivable answer was too elaborate for either of the two imbeciles to concoct.

“Ah, silence! I must be right, then.” He grabbed a fistful of Jim’s hair, wrenching his head back. Jim grunted and cried out, the pain eclipsed by the rage for Sebastian he felt. Everyone always fucking betrayed him, in the end.

“But know this,” Carl hissed. “Don’t pretend like it’s possible to be friends with someone like him. You’re not normal, you’re not good. You are _nothing_!” He picked up his pace, hammering Jim into the floor, finally coming with one of his stupid, ugly grunts.

Jim didn’t finish. He curled against the tile when it was over, his flushed cheek pressed against the cold. But Carl was soon yanking Jim to his feet. He grabbed paper towels to hurriedly clean up the mess. He never left Jim alone in the locker rooms, afraid of what Jim might do.

Jim thought of how it had felt to slip into the locker room during their practice and twist Sebastian’s locker combination. It hadn’t been hard to snatch a full list of locker combinations from the administration office. Jim had made a handy Xerox of the lockers of interest, stowed in his locker. He had Carl’s and Sebastian’s locker room combinations memorized.

“Ugh. Moran. Why him? Why _him_? What a fucking prick. He told everyone the plans as if he had written them, when we both knew that wasn’t true!”

Jim closed his eyes. Yes. He did as he was supposed to. Except he had told Carl Powers and had ruined the entire plan. Idiot.

“He’ll fucking pay,” Powers said.

Yes, Jim thought. He would.

__

Sebastian greeted Jim warmly at their next class, but Jim said nothing. He stared straight ahead, then quickly moved away from Sebastian to grab the specimen.

“Everything okay?” Sebastian asked.

Jim refused to even look at him. He wordlessly pushed the finished final report to Sebastian to hand in, then began scribbling on the day’s lab sheet, not even looking at the pig.

“Don't you want to look at the real thing? Here-”

“I know what I'm doing, Moran, so why don't you shut your useless maw,” Jim snarled under his breath, in a voice so vicious that it raised the hair on Sebastian's arms. He didn't dare say anything more, so he sat uselessly on his lab stool, examining his wrist. A light bruise was beginning to form where Carl had grabbed him, and he flushed, tugging his sleeve down. He stared at the marks, fingerprints.

His eyes widened. The marks were like Jim’s. He glanced over at Jim, horrified. Was it possible…? Sebastian thought back to Jim’s vicious reaction to Sebastian’s rugby mates, to Powers in particular. He thought of what Jim had said- “I know things about them that would make you throw up.” And how Carl had recognized Jim’s handwriting. How Carl was so fixated on hating him, even though Sebastian had never seen them interact.

Sebastian didn’t even acknowledge Miranda when she moved past him and gave his shoulder a warm squeeze.

When the bell rang, Jim leapt from his stool as of it was spring-loaded, but Sebastian wasn't going to let him go that easily.

“Jim, WAIT.” He bolted down the hall after him, and he could see the smaller teen all but flinging people out of the way as he tried to put more space in between them. Sebastian dodged a group of girls all clustering around a locker and grabbed Jim by the arm, just as he was entering the art room. “Wait!” he said breathlessly.

Jim turned to him, baring his teeth and yanking viciously. “Let GO of me!” he snarled.

Sebastian dragged Jim into the art room. “Did Powers hurt you?” Sebastian demanded once the door was closed.

Jim blinked at him, tugging his arm from Sebastian’s grasp. He frowned, his shoulders hunching. “What do you care if he did?” Jim snarled, his voice low.

He turned back toward his painting. It was nearly done now, and as Sebastian looked it over, he thought more and more that it looked as if the dark side was winning over the light. The dark strands were overtaking the exposed body in the middle, and the light strands were fleeing.

“You’re a fucking idiot, Moran,” Jim muttered.

“What?” Sebastian asked.

“Here I thought you were interesting. But all along, you were palling around with _Carl Powers..._ and for what? Because he’s a good athlete? Because everyone else tolerates him?”

Sebastian blinked. “What are you talking about? I hate Powers.”

Jim rounded on him. “Then why did you show him the plans?” he burst out, furious.

Oh. Sebastian’s stomach turned. “I dropped them,” he admitted. “It was a complete accident. Powers must have found them in the library or the hallway...he said he recognized your handwriting…”

A muscle in Jim’s jaw tightened. “Yes, he would,” he muttered. “You bloody idiot, Moran…”

“Jim, I would never give him ammunition on purpose. Believe me.” Sebastian stepped toward Jim, and slid his sleeve up, showing the bruises on his wrist.

Jim looked at Sebastian’s wrist, then back up at him. He frowned, as if doing some quick calculations.

“It must be nice,” Jim said finally, quietly. “To get away with pretending to be good. When we both know that you’re not.”

“I’m sorry?” Sebastian dropped his arm.

“To be so handsome, so athletic. People always want to assume the best from people like you. People like you can get away with _anything._ ” Those dark eyes held Sebastian hostage. Jim’s dark gaze stripped Sebastian naked, past flesh and muscle and bone to his core.

“I haven’t gotten away with anything,” he murmured. “I’ve never tried anything.”

“No,” Jim agreed thoughtfully after a moment. “No, you haven’t. Not yet.” His hand slid out to brush down Sebastian’s arm, pale fingers closing on his wrist, and he pulled Sebastian’s hand up once more to examine the bruising. His thumb drew over the mark on the underside of Sebastian’s wrist, so lightly that it sent a shivering tickle down Sebastian’s spine. Jim drew his arm closer, and for a moment Sebastian thought he was going to kiss his wrist. He could feel Jim’s warm breath on the delicate skin there. His mouth fell open slightly.

“Why didn’t you fight back?” Jim asked, his eyes meeting Sebastian’s instead.

Sebastian was pinned under his gaze. “I- are you kidding? I would be kicked off the rugby team, maybe even kicked out of school,” Sebastian said after a minute. “It wouldn’t be worth it, not with the fuss that Powers would put up.”

Jim’s face flickered with annoyance, then he grabbed Sebastian’s jaw, yanking his face close. Sebastian gasped- Jim’s grip was surprisingly strong, and he tried to yank his jaw away. They were almost nose to nose, Sebastian having to bend down slightly.

“What’s the real reason, Sebastian?” Jim’s voice was low, intense. “Don’t lie to me, it’s so very _dull_ when people lie to me all the time.”

“If I started, I wouldn’t be able to stop. I would have...I probably would have killed him-” Sebastian sputtered out, not realising it was true until the words were out of his mouth.

Jim’s thumb stroked the side of Sebastian’s cheek, and Sebastian was spellbound. “That’s right,” he said soothingly. He hummed. “Is that poor boy still in a coma, back in France?” he asked almost conversationally.

Sebastian froze. How could Jim possibly know about that? There had been an article, but it was in a tiny local paper, and in French besides. His name hadn’t even been published.

Jim smiled with unabashed delight. “Yes, Moran, I know all about what happened,” he said softly. “So is he still in a coma, or do you not bother to stay in touch?”

It had all been a mistake. Sebastian had gotten in a fight with Frances DePaul, who had entirely deserved a beating. He’d insulted Sebastian, and then Emile. Apparently what had been a shock to Sebastian had been common knowledge to DePaul, who said the most ignorant, hateful things, right to Emile’s face.

Sebastian had attacked him first, yes, but DePaul had held his own. For a while. Sebastian came away from the fight with a broken nose, a black eye, and two loose teeth. DePaul hadn’t walked at all. He was comatose, probably still. And no, Sebastian hadn’t stayed in touch. Even when DePaul had blacked out, Sebastian had kept hitting and kicking him, in an animalistic frenzy, only stopping when his schoolmates and two teachers forced him back. He had wanted to rip DePaul apart.

August Moran had been furious. Sebastian spent virtually the rest of time in France locked in his room, being taught by a private tutor. If it wasn’t for the hush money and reparation fees August had paid, he always reminded Sebastian, Sebastian might very well be in a French prison right now.

Along with his private, strict tutor, there had been anger management counseling. Sebastian had learned how to keep his fury and violent tendencies at bay. They had wanted to medicate him, but he had demonstrated through careful wording and monitored behavior that he had developed healthy coping mechanisms. The violence remained, of course, but it was caged, and Sebastian wasn’t about to let it out again. He was in control.

“He’s not a poor boy,” Sebastian told Jim. “He was an arrogant prick. I shouldn’t have gone so far- but I can’t say he didn’t deserve it.”

Jim smiled slowly, and began to circle Sebastian. “You see, Moran? You’re just like me...with a prettier, more palatable cover..”

Sebastian shivered. “I’ve never fucking tortured animals,” he spat.

This wasn’t true. Not that day in Germany, when Sebastian and been 13. On rare occasions, his father would take him on hunting trips, and taught Sebastian how to make clean kill shots, ever seeking to improve his marksmanship. Sebastian was forever trying to prove himself the best.

But on that day, the day he felled his first stag, it wasn’t a clean shot. The stag was down, but before Sebastian could celebrate, August told him that the kill wasn’t over. He had to finish it.

Sebastian had walked carefully toward the deer, worried he would leap back on his feet and charge at Sebastian, gore him through with his antlers in retaliation for wounding him.

The bullet pierced just below his neck, and Sebastian was surprised at how little blood there was. The stag’s flank rose up and down irregularly, taking ragged breaths. He whuffed in pain, and Sebastian could see the fear in his eyes as he stepped closer, shotgun in hand. He’d stopped in front of it, stared at it, fascinated. He didn’t kill the beast when it raised its head and issued a pained noise. He hadn’t killed the stag until August had called after him.

Sebastian had snapped back to reality then. He was taking too long. He finally lifted his gun and killed him neatly between the eyes. Sebastian enjoyed the killing part, too. He knew he could talk about felling his first stag with pride, but part of him instinctively knew that he shouldn’t revel in how he hurt the fallen stag, how he’d enjoyed watching the life leave his eye. It moved the hunting from a sport that was understood and accepted to something dark and wrong.

“Now, now, Sebastian,” Jim purred, pulling him back to the present. “Is that really true?”

“I’m not like you,” Sebastian said, and then Jim actually slapped him across the face, hard enough to sting.

Sebastian clapped his hand over his cheek. “What the hell is wrong with you?” he demanded, grabbing Jim by the collar.

Jim’s eyes widened as Sebastian yanked him close, but he kept his hands at his sides, and only laughed. “The same thing that’s wrong with you, Basher, only I have more brains. Mm, Basher. Basher...Isn’t that what your teammates call you? When you’re bashing others to the ground...the bloodlust in your eyes…It suits you…”

Jim cocked his head, and Sebastian let him go, pacing away before he punched Jim in the face, before he lashed out in an attack that wouldn’t end until...

“The problem, Basher, is that you’ve been told your instincts are _wrong._ They took a wild tiger and forced him into a rugby uniform, taught him to stand up straight and get good grades and fuck pretty girls like a gentleman, and all this time, your claws are still under your skin, your tail is still twitching.”

Jim’s words made Sebastian’s stomach churn. He couldn’t be right. Jim didn’t _know_ him. He spun smart-sounding lies to fill Sebastian with doubt. That was all.

Before Sebastian could retort, Jim continued calmly, “But don’t worry, Moran. Your instincts won’t go punished. If you just follow my lead, you can be who you really are.”

Sebastian came back to himself, whirling to face him. “Look, Moriarty, I don’t know what the fuck you think, but I’m not some...repressed fucking...animal!” He all but shouted. “And if this is you coming on to me, just bloody _stop._ I’m not a killer, and I’m definitely not a fucking _poof!_ ”

He regretted the words as soon as they had left his mouth. Now Jim looked as if he had been slapped, and his mouth parted slightly before he intoned lowly, “Get out.”

“I didn’t mean it- it’s fine that you are, but I’m not-”

“Moran, get out, _now._ I don’t have time for liars and I certainly don’t have time for drooling, incompetent ones like you who ignore the truth when it’s slapping them in the face,” Jim said, vitriol in his voice.

Sebastian whirled toward the door. “Oh, so when you slapped me in the face, you were playing the part of ‘truth’? You fucking brat!”

Jim just laughed in his face, harsh and humorless. Sebastian wanted to slam the door, but the school doors all closed on their own, with a careful slowness that made Sebastian want to scream. He kicked it the rest of the way closed, but not before hearing Jim say, “Don’t bother coming to the art reception, Sebastian. I don’t think they let wild beasts in, no matter how good of a mask they put on.”

Sebastian fumed, starting down the hall. Wild beasts...and a goddamn tiger analogy? He was a complete nutter. Insane. And wrong, so very wrong on every single fucking count. What the hell had he meant, that if Sebastian stuck with him, he could act on his “instincts” without getting caught? Did Jim really mean to insinuate that he would let Sebastian get away with murder?

Well, Sebastian wasn’t a fucking murderer, and he never would be. He hurried his pace to the canteen. By this point, he’d already missed half of lunch. He raced through the lunch line.  Miranda was at her usual table, but it was full. He stopped and brushed her shoulder. “Hey,” he said, a note of apology in his voice.

Her expression was slightly frosty, eyebrow raising. “Hey yourself,” she said.

“Is this because I was late to lunch today?” he snapped. “I had to sort out something, if that’s bloody all right with you.”

Miranda glared at him. “Thank you for letting me know.”

“Miranda...look, I don’t expect you to go to the game, I know you probably have rehearsal or something. But there’s a party afterwards, if you’re keen to go.”

Miranda’s expression softened slightly, but she shook her head. “A bunch of sloshed rugby blokes? Just my idea of a good time.”

“Forget it,” Sebastian snapped. “I’m sorry I was late. I didn’t mean to _neglect_ you.” It came out far more sarcastic than he’d intended, and Miranda glared once more, spinning away to sit with her friends, her back to him.

He swore under his breath, looking back at the rugby table. He could sit over there...but he especially didn’t want to see Powers right now. He looked down at the bruise forming on his wrist, then remembered the bruises on Jim’s. Had Powers really abused Jim? The thought made him sick. He left the canteen without eating.


	6. The Match

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW for gay slurs, sexual assault, and violence

_I hate to see you here_  
_You choke behind a smile_  
_A fake behind the fear_  
_The queerest of the queer_

**_"Queer" - Garbage (1995)_**

 

Sebastian couldn’t believe it. The match was going perfectly. Jim’s plan worked like magic. He had never seen his team gel so well, had never seen them throw the other team off balance so consistently.

The crowd was going wild as they neared the end of the first half. Sebastian threw to Powers, who was supposed to pass it on to Barnes, and then defend him as he went for a point. Except Powers kept the ball- he was going for the points himself, and he clobbered anyone in his way, including elbowing a Birchwood player in the face.

The ref blew his whistle. “That’s a penalty!” he shouted, breaking them off.

“Stick to the plan, Powers, and stop showing off! Let US bloody tackle!” Sebastian bellowed.

Carl didn’t seem to even hear him. He certainly didn’t act like it when he came back on the field a bit later and left Sebastian wide open, leading Sebastian to get brutally piled on and making him look like a fool.

By the time the first half ended, Birchwood and St. Cuthbert were tied, and Sebastian was livid. As soon as the break was called, he shoved past the others teammates and grabbed Carl by his shirt. “What the FUCK are you playing at? You are deliberately sabotaging the team’s efforts!”

“Easy, Sebastian, mate, come on,” Barnes muttered, grabbing his arm, but Sebastian flung him off.

Carl just laughed - that infuriating, callous laugh. “Don’t get your knickers in a twist, Moran. We can gain it back in the second half,” he sneered. “I was acting on instinct. Any athlete knows that instinct can beat a plan any time.”

“You modify when you need to, but you fucking COMMUNICATE. Were you thinking about anyone else when you went with your ‘instinct’? You left Sundarum wide open when you went for that shot, and Yurichev let a shot in because he was looking out for your arse instead of the other team!”

“Come on, Moran, let’s go get some water and pep talk it out, yeah?” Barnes said, looking nervously over at the coach, but Sebastian barely heard him.

“Awww, is your perfect plan not going as you wanted it to? Upset because I deflected some of the glory away from you for two fucking seconds?” Powers snapped back.

“That’s not what this is about, and you know it,” Sebastian snarled. They were practically chest to chest now, and Sebastian could see Coach Turnow running over to intervene. “So either fall in or get the fuck off my pitch!”

“YOUR pitch? It’s not yours, Moran. And I’ll play however. The fuck. I like.” Maybe it was the laugh in Powers’ voice, or the way he licked his lips, or maybe it was just that Sebastian had had bloody enough, but he decked Carl across the face, shoving him to the ground to punch him again.

Carl immediately retaliated with a blow to Sebastian’s stomach that knocked the breath out of him. The rest was a blur- Barnes’s and the coach’s hands prying them off each other, and then they were benched, Powers with a bloody towel and a pack of ice to his nose, Sebastian icing his bruised knee and holding his aching ribs.

“Disgraceful, absolutely disgraceful, the both of you,” Coach Turnow was saying. The rest of the team had shuffled uneasily into the locker rooms to prepare for the second half.

Sebastian couldn’t even look at Carl, but from the corner of his eye, Carl didn’t look ashamed at all.

“And Moran, I expected better from you. As team captain, it is your job to ensure everyone’s a team player. What sort of model are you setting when you attack a fellow teammate, unprovoked?”

“Oh, there was provocation, sir, believe me,” Sebastian muttered.

“I don’t want to bloody hear it, Moran! You should have saved your aggression for the other team. I’ll admit, it’s tempting to let you keep on just to beat Birchwood’s arse, but if you two can’t play on a team, then I won’t allow it. You’re benched for the rest of the game.”

“ _WHAT_?” Sebastian gasped. His ribs screamed in pain.

“You heard me. Get your bloody acts together and support your team from the sidelines. Shameful, utterly shameful…” The coach turned and left for the locker rooms.

Sebastian was shaking in fury. And Powers just laughed quietly, almost gently. “Oh, Basher,” he breathed in delight. “You really fucked yourself over, know that?”

“Oh, is that what happened? Because I think this would have gone a whole lot differently if you hadn’t been in the picture at all,” Sebastian seethed. “Now keep your trap shut, or you’ll have a lot more to worry about than a broken nose.”

“I don’t even think you broke it,” Carl said, pulling the ice back to prod it lightly. “You’re sweet when you try to hurt people, Moran.”

Sebastian closed his eyes, took a deep breath through his nose. He wished he lived in Jim’s world, a world where he could kill who he wanted and get away with it. If he attacked Carl again, he wouldn’t stop, not until Carl was dead. And then he would spend the rest of his life in prison. _He’s not worth it,_ he told himself. _He’s not worth your entire fucking life. Be the bigger person. Let it go._

He repeated every anger management adage and mantra during the remainder of the game, but even so, it was all he could do to cheer on his team and ignore Carl’s snide little comments.

When they won, Sebastian stood up and cheered loudly, despite the pain in his ribs. He hoped it was just a bruise and not a break. He felt a swell of pride for his team, especially Barnes, who had made the winning point. He grinned as Barnes roared his victory, the rugby team lifting Barnes onto their shoulders. And the best part was, they’d stuck to Sebastian’s - or Jim’s strategy. They had all trusted in it, and it had played out in their favor.

Mixed with Sebastian’s pride was a crushing disappointment that he hadn’t been able to be on the pitch. It was the most frustrating feeling in the world, watching from the sidelines, unable to run in when Sundarum needed backup, or Bailey had to pass too far for his range. Still. They had done it. They had won.

Sebastian and Powers were allowed back to the locker rooms, and they were both lost in the frenzy of victory, pulling into the giant mass of arms and shouts.

“Did you see that fucking pass?”

“Barnes, that was INCREDIBLE!”

“Hah, their defense weaknesses were completely what we’d planned for!”

“Congratulations, Barnes,” Sebastian said, when he could work through the throng enough to grab his friend’s shoulder.

“Cheers- all just following your plan, mate-” he grinned. “But, Basher-” Barnes leaned in closer. “What the fuck happened with you and Powers? What’s been going on?”

Sebastian sighed, shaking his head. “Clash of personalities. It’s fine.”

“You’re coming to the party, though, right?”

Sebastian winced. That’s right...there was a party tonight. With Powers. He forced a smile. “Wouldn’t miss it.”

Still, he lingered inside the locker rooms, waiting for Powers to leave, waiting for them all to leave.

“You coming, Moran?” Barnes asked. He, Sundarum, and Bailey were the last cluster to leave.

“I’ll catch up,” Sebastian promised. “I want to stretch out. I think I pulled something, and it only cramped up worse on the bench.”

“Well, don’t take too long, or all of the beer will be gone,” Barnes quipped, then at the last the locker room was empty. Only when Sebastian knew he was truly alone did he strip off his sweaty, dirt-stained uniform. He hadn’t wanted to be in the showers around Carl, hadn’t wanted his prying eyes. He looked himself over in the mirror for a moment, sliding his hands down his torso. No bruising on his ribs yet- how did one tell if they were broken just from looking? He tried bending to one side, and almost collapsed in pain.

“Ow...fuck-” he breathed through his teeth, moving to sit down shakily. What did one do for broken ribs, anyway?

Sebastian stood back up, finally turning on the showers and closing his eyes in the hot water. He gave a little sigh in relief, turning to rest his forearm against the tile and let the water massage over his back.

“You didn’t think I’d just let this end, did you, Moran?” Powers’ voice came from the doorway.

Sebastian felt like ice, and he turned to face Powers.

“Fuck off, Powers,” Sebastian said, hastily turning off the water and grabbing his towel, throwing it around his waist before Carl could leer any more at his body. “If I told the coach everything you’ve done, you’d be kicked off the team. And if today proved anything, it’s that they function just as well- if not better- without you.” His heart was pounding as Powers advanced on him, fully clothed while Sebastian shivered, dripping wet.

“You look sexy when you’re all wet, Moran,” Powers murmured, biting his lower lip.

Sebastian was taken aback. This was a direct come-on, a provocation he couldn’t stand by idly for. He wound back to punch Powers, but Carl gave Sebastian such a tremendous shove that he hit the tile wall hard. “And you can’t just have me thrown off the team, Moran. I’m not an idiot.” Before Sebastian could retaliate, Powers quickly pinned him against the wall, a hand clamping over his mouth.

Sebastian was so taken aback that his reflexes were all thrown off, and he gave a muffled shout of protest against Carl’s large hand. Carl was close, too close.

“If you try to kick me off the team, everyone would know how _weak_ you are.” Carl’s other hand slid down Sebastian’s chest, then lower. Sebastian’s heart sped up as he felt Carl’s hand squeezing him through his towel. He shouted against Carl’s hand and struggled, managing to throw Carl off at last, but not before Carl had ripped Sebastian’s towel off and tossed it to the wet floor. Now naked, Sebastian bolted for the exit, but Carl was on him again, wrestling him back against the wall. Carl was enormous, and so strong- Sebastian shoved at him, but it was like pushing against a wall.

“GET OFF OF ME!” Sebastian shouted, but Carl’s hand closed over his mouth again, his other hand pinning Sebastian’s wrists above his head.

“Oh, shove it, Moran. We both know I could punch you into next week, and isn’t it so generous of me that I’m giving you what you want?”  
Sebastian shook his head as violently as he could manage, shouting through his hand. Carl’s fingers dug bruisingly into his jaw. Sebastian’s furious gaze met Carl’s eyes, but he had to look away as he felt Carl’s hips pressing lewdly against his own.

“I know what you want, Moran. So stop pretending.” He could feel Carl’s erection against his hips, and he was furious when his own body began to respond, heat spooling low in his gut. He didn’t care what Carl said, what his body said. He didn’t want this.

He shouted, wrenching his head free from Carl’s hand to gasp out, “Get the the fuck OFF me!”

Carl snarled and grabbed a fistful of Sebastian’s hair, bashing his head back against the tile until Sebastian saw stars. “Nobody can hear you, Moran,” he said intimately. One hand kept Sebastian’s wrists pinned while the other closed round his cock. “And even if they could...would you really want them to find you like this?”

Sebastian’s head spun. His knees buckled from the pain, and he felt Carl’s arm slither around his waist to keep him upright. Carl’s every movement was invasive, pawing. He gave Sebastian a few slow strokes, and Sebastian panicked. Carl was right. What if Barnes or Sundarum walked in? Even if they accused Carl, Sebastian would be accused too. He had an erection, and he was naked...and it would be so easy, he thought, to spin all of his anger at Carl as sexual frustration. Not to mention his friendship...if that’s what it was...with Moriarty.

“So just keep you pretty mouth shut, Moran, or I’ll let everyone know you pulled out your prick and tried to fuck me with it.” Carl’s cruel laugh was soft, shared between them. He wet his lips. “You were hard before I even touched you.”

Sebastian’s head throbbed, so much so that he barely noticed his ribs anymore. He wanted to kill Powers, but right now he was in so much pain that he couldn’t fight back. What if Carl slammed his head against the tile one more time? He’d probably get knocked out and then...he didn’t want to think about what Powers could do to him then.

The pain was mixing with pleasure though, and Carl’s large hand knew exactly what it was doing, twisting expertly in a way that made Sebastian’s breath come short. “You look so good like this, when you’re not prattling on, pretending to be the greatest thing that ever happened to this school,” he breathed against his mouth. “Because we both know what you really are, don’t we?”

He bit down on Sebastian’s lip with nauseating slowness, then his tongue traced along the inner edge. “Just a gay slut.”

Sebastian shuddered. “F-fuck- you-”

“Oh, keep talking, Moran,” he said, stroking faster. “It’s only going to end up worse for you if you do. Or for your girlfriend. Or for Moriarty. Another gay slut.”

Sebastian hissed in a sharp breath, his head falling back against the tile, if only to move away from Carl’s cruel face. He realised with a sickening swoop of his stomach that Carl might have done more than just hurt Moriarty physically. Had he done this to him, too? Attacked him….raped him?

It wouldn’t be rape, though...it couldn’t be, because he was erect, so some sick part of him must want this… And fuck, he’d never gotten a handjob from a man before, and he wanted it to be _anyone_ but Carl Powers…

Was his head bleeding? He couldn’t tell if that was water or blood he felt trickling on his scalp.

“Shhh, let it happen…” Carl said, grabbing Sebastian jaw and squeezing it again. He paused to slide his thumb along the sensitive head of Sebastian’s cock, and Sebastian shuddered, his toes curling against the tile. “The sooner you come, the sooner I’ll leave you alone,” he soothed.

It was all a trick, a cruel trick, but Sebastian was so worked up that now all he wanted was to get off and have it be done with. This had to be an awful dream. If he just got it over with, maybe he’d wake up. He bit down on his lip as Carl picked up a steady pace, the strokes swift, full and satisfying.

Sebastian huffed out a noise through his nose. Carl was at least shutting up now, seemingly intent on getting Sebastian to come. Sebastian’s eyes slid open, if only just to check over Carl’s shoulder and make sure that he hadn’t gathered the whole team to watch.

“That’s it…” he said, and fingers were pressing up behind Sebastian’s balls, finding some spot that made Sebastian quake and swallow a full-throated moan. “I bet you’d look gorgeous on my cock, Basher,” he said devilishly, and he picked up the pace. Sebastian’s hips met his rhythm against his mind’s will. “No...I _know_ you would,” Carl amended.

Sebastian shook his head against Carl’s hand, afraid to speak up. He was so ashamed that he was so fucking _scared_ and _powerless_ against this piece of shit.

“Oh, stop, Sebastian, you’re so close, look at you. You love it. You’re going to come for me, Moran. Then you’re going to keep your mouth shut, or I’ll ruin you.”

His grip on his cock was perfect, and Sebastian wanted to hold out, but then Carl was purring in his ear, drawing his tongue along the shell of it, and his thumb was on the head, then -

“ _Ah-_ ” Sebastian had been so tensed, so shaky, that the release almost made him slide down the wall. There were perhaps five seconds of blissful relief, when all the pain was replaced by pleasure flooding his system. But when the sensation passed, everything was a thousand times worse. His entire body ached, and he hadn’t woken up in bed after a shit dream, and he was overcome with shame and dread.

He used his remaining strength to give Carl a vicious shove. “Touch me again, and I’ll break your neck,” he whispered.

“I count on it,” Powers mocked, then he smeared his messied hand across Sebastian’s cheek. He spun away from him. “See you at the party,” he said, then disappeared.

Sebastian spat, hurriedly turning on the shower and scrubbing off his face. He scrubbed at his whole body with his bare hands, almost feverishly trying to erase Carl’s touch from his skin. He eventually staggered and slid to sit under the water, drawing his knees up close. He had never felt so disgusting, or so scared.

His head was throbbing so badly that his entire skull felt like it was expanding and collapsing with each breath. He finally pulled himself to his feet, breathing raggedly, and turned off the water with a shaking hand. Sebastian’s towel was soaked through, utterly useless. He padded to the sinks, dripping water and looking over his shoulder nervously. He looked at himself in the mirror, and that’s when it sunk in what had just been done to him. What he had _allowed_ to happen to him. His hand slid over his mouth and squeezed his eyes shut. No. No. “Pull yourself together, Moran,” he growled at himself, almost in his father’s voice. “Man up and fucking take care of it.”

He opened his eyes, blinking several times as he examined his pupils. No concussion, as far as he could self-diagnose. Well, that was a bloody miracle, if it was true…

He gingerly touched the back of his head, his side screaming in protest. His fingers came away with some watered-down blood. Nothing gushing, then. Sebastian grabbed paper towels and began to dab at his head.

He dried himself with the rest of the paper towels, and was still damp as he clumsily put on his dry clothes, which clung to him. He had to go to this party. If he stayed away, then Powers won.

It was tempting, though, so tempting to just go home, to say he’d felt sick and couldn’t make it. His stomach lurched, however, when he thought of what sort of lies Powers might concoct about his absence.

He had to go.

 


	7. Party

_All of the rumors_  
_Keeping me grounded_  
 _I never said, I never said that they were_  
 _Completely unfounded_

**_"Speedway" - Morrissey (1994)_ **

It was funny, Jim thought as he watched the mid-match fight from high up on the bleachers, how easily Moran and Powers came to blows. Men and their fists, thinking they could solve something with them. It should have been fun to watch, his two pawns losing control in front of a crowd, and it was certainly delicious to watch Powers get benched. But he couldn’t feel the same joy about Moran.

Moran’s broad back was towards Jim, but even from afar, Jim could see his entire body tense as Powers leaned in to mutter to him during the game. What would Powers to do Moran after the game was done?

Jim shook his head minutely. Powers wouldn’t get away with that sort of thing. He understood brute strength, and Moran had enough of that to put up a good fight. Jim realised at some point that he was watching the two players on the bench more than he was actually watching the game. Then again, what did it matter? Every detail of his strategy worked as he knew it would, yet when St. Cuthbert’s came away victorious, every onlooker around him had the gall to look surprised. People, Jim had realised years and years ago, were idiots.

Moran didn’t look pleased, as far as Jim could see. Oh, he plastered on a fake smile, but the boy was an awful liar - no poker face at all. It was rather endearing, actually. He would never be able to deceive Jim, which was rather comforting.

Jim waited for Powers outside of Powers’ car, as he always did after a match, but Powers didn’t show up. He had likely caught a cab to wherever their victory party was, and thank god for that. Jim had more important things to do than to bend over for a soon-to-be-dead man.

__

Sebastian hesitated before he rapped on the door of the shabby flat. He’d found a stocking cap in his satchel and had thrown it on to hide his head wound.

Sundarum flung open the door, a wave of noise crashing into the hallway. “OI, we wondered when you’d get here, mate! Come in!”

Sebastian bit back a pained noise as Sundarum’s hand crashed down on his neck, dragging him inside. He pushed the six pack of beer he’d bought from the corner shop into Sundarum’s hands. Was it too late to turn and flee and complain of a splitting headache? Probably so.  He tried not to wince as the bodies of revelers threatened to crush him and the throbbing music made his teeth rattle.

“WHAT TOOK YOU SO LONG?” Sundarum was yelling over the music.

“LONG QUEUE AT THE SHOP,” Sebastian lied. A wave of nausea passed over him as he caught sight of Powers, laughing on a sagging couch. Laughing and grinning as if he hadn’t nearly given Sebastian a concussion, as if he hadn’t, an hour ago, told Sebastian that he’d look “gorgeous on his cock.” As if Sebastian hadn’t gotten off in the end, after all. That part horrified Sebastian the most. How could his body have betrayed him like that? How could he ever convince someone that he hadn’t wanted it when he’d had an orgasm?

The music wasn’t quite so unbearably loud in the kitchen, although it was teeming with bodies, grabbing beers and pouring shots.

“So, you did turn up to the party you invited me to!” Miranda’s voice was slightly accusatory. Sebastian turned around, shocked.

“I didn’t think you’d come,” he said faintly.

“I had a lapse in judgment. ...Sebastian, are you all right?” Her face softened, leaning closer to inspect him.

Fuck, did he look that bad? “Can we talk? Alone?” he leaned in to ask over the din of the party.

Finding a quiet place proved almost impossible. They ended up finding an unused guest room upstairs that was largely dominated with boxes. There wasn’t even a place to sit.

“I can’t believe you came to the party,” Sebastian said, closing the door behind them. “I was a complete dick.”

Miranda sighed, her hands sliding to Sebastian’s waist. “I was at the game, too,” she murmured. “I saw the fight.”

“Fuck, really?” Miranda’s touch was warm and gentle, but Sebastian winced as her thumb pressed against his rib.

“What happened? I looked for you after the game, but nobody knew where you were.”

How could he possibly explain? “I called him out on his bullshit, that’s all. He wouldn’t back down. He’s had it in for me for weeks now.”

Miranda’s hands slid up his chest, light and gentle this time, and her touch felt so good, so soft. Her hands slid to his shoulders, kneading his muscles gently. “Sebastian…” She leaned in and kissed him gently, carefully, as if he’d break. He kissed her back just as gently. Could she feel the spot where Carl had bit down on his lip? He felt like Carl’s imprints were seared all over his skin, marking him.

“I don’t know what to do,” he whispered. How would Miranda react if she knew what had really happened?

“You did what you thought was right,” she said. “I just don’t want you to get hurt.”

Sebastian cautiously lowered himself down to the floor to sit. “Too late,” he grimaced.

Miranda sat next to him. “Is this why you’ve been distant? I thought maybe something was going on with you and Moriarty, but if it was Carl this whole time-”

“Moriarty? What do you mean?”

“You two seemed tense around each other, and all those days you were late for lunch…” She shrugged.

“It was just project-related stuff,” Sebastian said hurriedly, too hurriedly, because Miranda leaned away from him slightly, pulling at a strand of carpet.

“Right.”

“What?” Sebastian snapped, irked.

“It’s fine,” Miranda said to the carpet. There was an uncomfortable silence. “I just wish you trusted me enough to tell me the truth. There’s so much I don’t know about you. Like, it’ll be so easy to talk to you, for while…” Her hand reached for his, their fingers twining. “But then you go...far off somewhere. I don’t know.”

Sebastian swallowed. Was he really so bad at faking it? Being normal? Jim’s words swam in his head, that bored, knowing tone, telling him that he wasn’t normal, and that he should stop trying to be. “What do you want to know?”

She looked up at him, then took a deep breath. “Like...what’s going on with you and Carl? Why is he so furious at you? And why have you ditched me more than once to go chase after Moriarty?”

“I told you! I called Carl out on his bullshit and he didn’t like it, and Moriarty is a tetchy little bastard and a difficult lab partner.”

Miranda looked at him quizzically. “You’re a really shitty liar, you know that?”

Sebastian bristled, and moved to stand, but Miranda caught his arm. “Wait- Sebastian, I didn’t mean it to be an accusation or anything. I wish you’d just...open up. It’s so frustrating.”

“Maybe you wouldn’t like me if I opened up,” Sebastian snarled, tugging his arm away. “Ever think about that?”

Miranda just stared at him, her moudth slightly agape, then she gave a harsh, huff of a laugh. “God, Moran, could you just stop being a cliche for two seconds?”

So she thought he was fake. Just like everyone else, apparently. He stood up, wincing as his ribs protested in pain. “A cliche? That’s just how I fucking _feel._ I’m sorry if that comes off as too _trite_ to you, but you have no fucking CLUE what I dealt with today-”

“Then TELL ME what you dealt with!” Miranda shouted.

“As if that would help,” Sebastian spat. “Just leave it, yeah? Can’t we just go back to how things were? We can just-”

“Are you gay?” Miranda asked sharply, interrupting him. She was still sitting, her knees drawn up to her chest.

Sebastian took a step back. “W-what? Who the fuck told you that? Was it Carl? Because you know he lies about everything.”

Miranda looked embarrassed, scared even. “Nobody told me. Are you, though?”

“No!” Sebastian snapped. “Why would you even ask that?”

“I wouldn’t be mad,” Miranda said quickly. “I just need to know. I don’t want to keep...doing this if you’re….”

“I’m not,” Sebastian snapped, feeling betrayed. “I like girls. Jesus, if I’m such a bad liar, how do you think I’d fake my way through sex? Did you think that was all fake? Do you think that I hated it?”

Miranda winced. “Are you bisexual?”

Was he?  

"No,” he said firmly. “Can you please believe me on this? Please.”

Miranda stood, keeping her back against the wall.

“I’m sorry that I’ve been distant. Carl brings out the worst in me. And Moriarty…” He frowned, and shook his head. Carl had hurt Moriarty, maybe in worse ways than he cared to think about.

Miranda reached out and took Sebastian’s hand, slowly pulling him toward her. Her hands settled at his hips, more carefully this time.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, leaning in toward her.

They kissed again, a gentle kiss that slowly deepened until Sebastian’s stomach twisted in disgust at the memory of Carl’s breath against his face. He pulled back. He could hear the team chanting over the music downstairs, drunkenly celebrating their victory.  “And you even came to the game for me?” he whispered. Miranda nodded. “I really didn’t deserve that,” he smiled softly against her lips.

“No, you really don’t,” Miranda laughed softly. Her hand twined up into his hat and into his hair. Sebastian hissed.

“Jesus, Sebastian, do you have a head wound?” She pulled back and turned on the main lights, peeling back Sebastian’s hat to look.

“It’s not all that bad…” he said quickly.

Miranda sucked in a breath at the sight. “This didn’t happen on the field, did it?” she said quietly.

Sebastian turned to give her a pained look. “Miranda, please. Just...drop it. I’m fine.” He wasn’t fine. He was failing at everything. “Please, I’ll be a better boyfriend, I’ll be a better _friend_ , I just can’t tonight. I don’t even want to go back to the party.”

Miranda’s brow furrowed, considering. “You need to rest, anyway. Let’s make an escape route.”

“I don’t want to come off as weak,” he muttered, almost too quiet to hear. Powers would notice, Sebastian was sure. Powers would call him out as a weakling for not even having one beer after their “little fight.

“You’re not weak, Sebastian,” she promised. “Make the rounds really quickly, then we can slip out. They’re all so blind drunk at this point that they’ll hardly care. I want to leave anyway. Dress rehearsal starts at eight tomorrow morning.”

“Your play’s next weekend,” he remembered aloud. “I’ll be there. With flowers.”

They slipped downstairs, hand in hand. Sundarum all but crashed into them, looking Miranda up and down. “Nice, Basher. You two do it?”

“Fuck off, Sundarum,” Sebastian muttered, wondering if Sundarum would even remember this interaction in the morning.

“Right, go letch over someone else,” Miranda smirked, elbowing him lightly.

“Wow, Basher, you trust slutty Velasquez at a party with a bunch of rugby boys? I’m impressed with your faith in her,” Powers’ voice rose above the music as he stepped in. “You two aren’t leaving _yet,_ are you?”

Sebastian tried his best to keep his face immobile. His arm slid around Miranda’s shoulders protectively; he could feel how tense they were. Miranda responded by letting her hand slide up Sebastian’s chest. “‘Bas and I have more interesting things to do tonight,’’ she said blithely, and Sebastian was amazed at how cool her voice sounded. “Come on, Sebastian.’’

She steered him toward the door, and Sebastian felt a wave of gratitude at her quick thinking. He didn’t miss Carl’s sneering comment as they left, though. “Well, isn’t that typical. Moran doesn’t care about the team. All he cares about is his cock.”

“Keep walking, Sebastian, just keep walking,” Miranda muttered, not turning around as she guided him swiftly towards the door.

It was all Sebastian could do to obey. He grit his teeth until they were out of the block of flats completely. “I _hate_ him,” he snarled, once they were out in the cold night.

“Sebastian, it’s okay. He’s just trying to rile you up,” Miranda murmured, squeezing his hand.

“It’s working,” he muttered, kicking a crumpled beer can down the sidewalk. But he squeezed her hand back.

“He’s not worth it. Come on.” Sebastian followed Miranda down the street, resolving to be a better boyfriend, a better teammate, a better person. And, he vowed, he would never, _ever_ let Powers get to him again.

__

Sebastian, exhausted though he was, couldn’t sleep that night. He kept seeing Carl’s face, kept hearing Carl’s laugh. He was furious that he was letting someone like _Carl Powers_ get to him like this. He kept playing out the scene in the locker room, replaying different versions, everything he should have done. In his mind, he punched Carl Powers into a coma, knocked out every last one of his teeth, dislocated his shoulder.

In some versions, Jim Moriarty was there, grinning and coaxing Sebastian on. Of course he would be...he thought Sebastian was a murderer lying in wait. A _tiger._ Perhaps Sebastian could be, for he could imagine nothing more satisfying than splitting Carl Powers’ skull open with his bare hands. If only such things were possible.

__

On Monday, Sebastian avoided Powers fastidiously. When he arrived at the biology classroom, he didn’t know what to expect from Moriarty. After their last interaction, he wouldn’t have been surprised if Jim entirely ignored him. He wasn’t prepared for the sight of Jim with ugly bruises across his throat, clear imprints of someone’s fingers.

Jim did an odd thing. He looked up at Sebastian and scanned him head to toe, assessing. Then he stared blatantly into Sebastian’s eyes, as if daring Sebastian to ask about the bruises.

Sebastian kept quiet, giving only a short nod in greeting and taking his seat. Jim was stiff, but he didn’t seem angry. He shared his lab notes and passed the tongs and pincers when required, but he didn’t utter a word.

In the silence, Sebastian assessed Jim as well. When Jim hunched over their work, as he was now, he looked compact, but powerful, energy shifting underneath his shoulder blades. Sebastian liked his expressive eyebrows, especially when he was locked in thought, tuning the rest of the world out. Sebastian recalled the gorgeous, sprawling, dark webs of color and image in his painting. Was that what it was like inside Moriarty’s head? His gaze drifted to Jim’s ugly bruises. Had Carl done that?

With five minutes left of lab, Jim still hadn’t breathed a word to him. Finally, Sebastian couldn’t take it anymore and growled under his breath, in German, “ _I need to talk to you. About Carl.”_

At first he thought Jim hadn’t heard him, or was continuing to steadfastly ignore him. Nearly two minutes passed before Jim said back, also in German, “ _Is this about the fight during the game? That was a rather sordid display._ ” His voice sounded husky and weak.

“You were there?” Sebastian murmured in English. The way Jim talked about rugby so disdainfully...but perhaps he had wanted to see his machinations come to life.

“ _In German_ ,” Jim said patiently, like a professor.

“ _After,_ ” Sebastian finally said.

Jim spared him the first glance since the start of class, and cleared his throat, wincing in pain. “ _In the art room. Stay well behind me._ ”

Sebastian was beginning to associate the scent of the art room - the strong smells of tempera and oil paints, India ink and clay - with Jim. He felt his shoulders loosen as he closed the door behind him. Jim had turned on his music, quieter than last time.

“What happened?” he rasped out, wasting no time.

Sebastian sat down, trying to hang onto the initial calm he’d felt. He couldn’t look at Jim as he told it, and he felt increasingly nauseous as he recounted it. As much as it sickened him to relive it, he felt he mustn’t leave anything out.

“I should have fought back. I was too weak- and he almost fucking knocked me unconscious- I should have fought harder,” Sebastian said, rubbing his eyes with the heels of his hands.

“Yes, you should have,” Jim said simply.

Sebastian stared up at him in shock, and was only rewarded with a disdainful eyebrow. “If you came looking for pity, Moran, then you came to the wrong person.” Jim stepped toward him. “Powers feeds off the weakness of others. It was clever of him to realise your insecurity with your sexuality. I wouldn’t have pegged him for that.” Jim’s eyes slid over him.

“Piss off. I’m not-” Sebastian started, but Jim cut him off with his hand.

“Moran, what did I say? No boring, boring lies, or I’m DONE listening to you,” he said.

Sebastian shut his mouth. “You said he feeds off insecurities.”

Jim just raised an eyebrow.

“Then why is he targeting you? You don’t seem at all insecure.”

Jim looked at him for a moment. “You finally figured it out, did you? That Carl likes to use me like a stupid little wind-up toy? All it took was a blatant attempt at strangulation for you to figure that one out! He was _sooo_ careless this weekend.” Jim paused to cough.

“H-how long has this- has he-” Sebastian stumbled, scarcely able to breathe. He thought he had been angry at Powers before, but now, a white hot fury was rising up in him, unparalleled to anything before. He couldn’t shut out the image of Carl’s broad hands wrapping around Jim’s pale throat, threatening to squeeze the life out of him.

“Seven months, more or less. He found me an easy target. No friends and a weak body. This is the first time he was so _careless_ with his blows,” Jim groused, far too casually, Sebastian thought. He couldn’t believe Jim would allow himself to be used like that.

“But-” Sebastian protested, “You knew everything about me at first glance, shit that nobody else knows about me. Surely you could dig up some dirt on Powers, expose him for what an arse he really is-”

“Yes, very good, Moran,” Jim said, but his sarcasm was edged with something like admiration. “I’m working on it.” He closed his eyes for a moment, giving a little hum. “I want it to be big. Humiliating. Humiliation would be nice in person, of course...but bastards like him deserve to die, don’t you think?”

“What are you saying?” Sebastian asked carefully.

“Have you ever noticed, Sebastian, how people suddenly become _saints_ when they die young? Take your precious Kurt Cobain-” He smirked at the Nirvana pins on Sebastian’s knapsack.

“Oi, lay off him,” Sebastian growled.

“See? Exactly what I mean,” Jim said merrily. “He was just a mediocre musician, or at least one of little note, until he died too young. Now, doesn’t it piss you off, Sebastian, that everyone thinks he’s the _greatest_ when they didn’t give a shit about him when he was alive?”

“What’s your point?” Sebastian asked, cross.

“If Carl were to die young, I want to make sure that he wouldn’t have any chance of sainthood,” Jim said, grinning widely. It was a scary grin, bordering on unhinged.

“Jesus fucking Christ, Jim, a dog is one thing but you can’t-”

“Moran! I would never,” Jim said, and his indignance was so believable that it took Sebastian back for a half a second. “Don’t be silly, murder is _bad._ There are _consequences,_ ” he said ironically. “I only mean that...well, the world deserves to see a person’s true colors, dead or alive.”

“I- I suppose. But Jim, how can you let him...hurt you like that?” Sebastian asked.

Jim’s face grew cold. “Oh, one gets used to it, I suppose.” He stepped toward Sebastian. “You learn how to avoid breaks, you know when to push someone and when to give in to avoid maximum damage. You learn to keep yourself stretched open and ready- just in case-”

“JESUS, stop!” Sebastian shouted, horrified.

“Is the truth too much, Moran?” Jim asked blandly.

It was. Sebastian trembled with fury. “I’ll murder him, I’ll fucking MURDER him.”

“Easy, Moran. He won’t touch me again. I’ve made sure of that. Every relationship has its tipping point after all,” he said. “As for the permanent solution...remember what I said about saints. All in good time.” His silky, lulling tone almost pulled Sebastian off the edge of his unbearable rage. Jim paused for a moment, as if waiting for Sebastian to calm, then finally said, “The art reception is Wednesday, remember. If you wanted to come.”

“I didn’t realise I was still invited,” Sebastian said.

“Leave your rage and denial at the door, darling,” Jim said. “Now, I think that’s rather settled, don’t you? You only have five minutes for lunch. Off you pop.” He waved vaguely toward the door, then returned his attentions to his painting, turning his back to Sebastian as if the entire conversation hadn’t happened.


	8. Defaced

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW for gay slurs

_My mind is set on overdrive_   
_The clock is laughing in my face_   
_A crooked spine_   
_My senses dulled_   
_Passed the point of delirium_

**_"Brain Stew" - Green Day (1995)_ **

 

Jim hadn’t calculated nearly dying that weekend. He also hadn’t calculated that Powers would attack Sebastian like that. But of course, Powers, the oaf, had admitted to it all on Sunday. He’d demanded Jim meet him on Sunday, and he was all swagger and grins, laughing and laughing about how he’d cornered Sebastian and given him exactly what he wanted.

It had made Jim’s stomach curl unpleasantly, the idea of Moran being coerced, just has Jim had been. It was stupid that he would care at all. Not just stupid, but illogical. Why should he care how someone else felt, when it would only cost him unnecessary mental energy? But as much as he tried not to care, Powers had kept gloating, kept describing in lurid detail, until Jim had finally snapped and kicked Powers off of him. “Enough,” he spat darkly. “I don’t have time for this.”

Jim had hastily zipped up his trousers and grabbed his rucksack, his tape recorder catching every word. He would edit out Sebastian’s name, but he at least had yet another confession he could use against Carl.

Powers was still riding on such a high from Friday’s match and the ensuing assault that Jim had assumed he would be able to slip away this time without too many ramifications.

Instead, Powers had grabbed the shoulder of his rucksack and yanked Jim back. “You don’t have time?” he sneered. “You think I care about that?”

“Let go, Powers, you can have me tomorrow at our usual time,” Jim snarled, trying to rip his rucksack back. “I’m not in the mood today-”

Carl grabbed Jim’s arm bruisingly, his grip also tightening on Jim’s rucksack. “Aw, Moriarty, are you jealous that I showed Moran some loving and left you alone all night?” Jim noticed, with horror, that his bag wasn’t properly closed, textbooks and papers threatening to spill out, along with-

“Don’t be dull, Carl, now give it-” Jim tugged at his rucksack again, but at the same time, Carl wrenched it from Jim’s grip, tossing it to the floor. Pencils, astronomy books, and papers scattered out across the floor, along with an unmistakable, clunky tape recorder, red light still shining steadily.

There was a horrified silence. “What the fuck is this?” Powers finally growled, and swept to pick up the recorder.

“It’s for lectures so I can relisten to them for studying,” Jim said steadily, not daring to blink as he looked Carl in the eye. “It must have started recording when you knocked it to the floor. Cheers for that.”

Carl’s hand flew to Jim’s throat, slamming him against the wall and squeezing his windpipe. “Don’t. You. Fucking. Dare.” Jim had never seen him so furious. Jim was also struggling for air, and clawed at Carl’s throat, drawing in reedy, desperate breaths. Powers’ thumb pressed the rewind button for a few seconds, then pressed play.

“You should have seen him, Jim. I made that pretty, arrogant mouth shut up all right. That thick cock of his-”

“Enough! I don’t have time for this.”

“You don’t have time? You think I care ab-”

Carl punched the recording off, his hand tightening on Jim’s throat. “You’ve been recording me?” he hissed. “Was that your plan, Moriarty?”

Jim began to see black spots. His throat was going to be crushed. He dug his nails into Carl’s wrists, gasping like a drowning fish. The only benefit to dying like this was that Powers would never, ever get away with it. He would spend the rest of his life in prison for murder, and wasn’t that nearly as good as the permanence of death?

A wild, manic grin spread over Jim’s face, even as his vision began to completely blur. He didn’t want to die, but if Carl thought that he was winning here, he was dead wrong. He just wished he had the breath to tell him so-

Just before Jim passed out completely, Carl dropped him to the floor. Air rushed into his lungs, and he choked and coughed, his throat aching. “My god, I’ve never seen someone with such a fucking death wish,” Carl spat. “Not that I blame you. I’d kill you if I could get away with it, Moriarty.” His voice was now deathly quiet, sincere. “And who knows? Maybe I could.” He kicked Jim in the ribs, then grabbed Jim’s head up by a fistful of his hair. “How many of those tapes did you make?”

Every breath hurt. Jim grinned anyway. “Dozens. Nearly every meeting. But, Carl darling-” he paused to cough, doubled over. “-Where did I hide them? So- I think we need to make a little agreement, you and I…” He cleared his throat, his voice strained and raspy. “I can be very reasonable. You don’t touch me again. Or I send a nice little compilation to the headmaster’s office.”

“I don’t touch you, and you won’t share,” Powers repeated.

“Right,” Jim nodded. “So long as you live, I won’t ever release them. I’m a man of my word, Powers. I think we both know that, don’t we?” He smiled humorlessly.

“So long as I live? Are you planning on trying to kill me, Moriarty?” Powers barked out a disdainful laugh.

“If you don’t touch me, I won’t ever lay a finger on you again, rest assured,” Jim said bitterly. “Just leave me alone.”

The wounded victim front seemed to work. Powers took a step back, then stomped on the tape recorder until it was well and truly destroyed. He glanced down at one of the scattered papers, and picked it up. “Oh, and look at this. Are these locker combinations, Jim?”

Jim’s eyes closed, his head hung. Fuck. He should have destroyed that a long time ago. After all, he had Carl’s locker combination memorised now.

“I’ll be taking them, then,” Carl said, and Jim hated the smugness in his voice. “And I’m going to be looking at my locker contents very carefully. Oh, and...if I keep to that agreement and the tapes still get out...I will kill you, regardless of the consequences.”

“Oh-” Jim cleared his throat and hoarsely muttered, “I’m sure you would.”  
__

If there had been rugby practice that day, Sebastian would have murdered Carl where he stood. As it was, he was able to avoid Powers all day, once again sitting with Miranda and her friends in the canteen, his back to the athlete.

To make things up with Miranda, he’d invited her over for dinner that night. His father was off at some conference in Geneva, but having company over meant his mother had held off on her 4:30 double martini, so she wasn’t a complete embarrassment, although she did make a vaguely passive-aggressive comment about Miranda’s long, dark hair, and how she could recommend some product that would make it less frizzy.

Thank God Sana was there. She’d served up an incredible lamb korma, and she and Miranda had chattered away about their favorite recipes, and the differences in Spanish and Pakistani cooking.

They excused themselves from dinner to go “study.” Mother hadn’t batted an eye, but Sana had raised an critical eyebrow. When Miranda excused herself to the loo and Mother had drifted into the living room with a tall glass of wine, Sana pulled Sebastian aside. “ _She’s a very lovely girl. I do hope you are serious with her. And careful. A girl like that doesn’t need to get her life ruined by someone like you_ ,” she said in Urdu, and raised her eyebrows meaningfully.

Sebastian blushed and shifted uncomfortably. Somehow, Sana always knew about his sex life, and she was always uncompromisingly frank about it. “I’m always careful. Can we not have this conversation?”

His _ustani_ clucked her tongue. “Always careful, hah! How often have I heard that one before? For a man, it’s a mistake he can walk away from. For a woman, she must make a decision she will live with for the rest of her life, whether or not she brings the child into the world,” she said in English.

“I understand,” Sebastian said more seriously, meeting her eyes as long as he could without feeling completely embarrassed.

Sana kissed his forehead and stroked his hair affectionately. “You look tired, _albelaa_.”

“I didn’t sleep well this weekend,” he admitted, but didn’t meet Sana’s eyes. Her simple affections made him want to cry, to fold into her arms and be comforted.

Instead, he stepped back and forced a smile. “Don’t worry, rugby season ends soon, then I can focus my free time on sleeping and eating.”

When Miranda returned, they excused themselves and spent a sweaty hour in Sebastian’s bed. It helped - her soft curves were so different from Carl’s hard body and rough hands, and when she kissed him while she was on top, her loose, dark hair fell around him like a curtain, blocking the rest of the world out.

It felt amazing like that, her riding him, controlling the pace and the angle. “Mmm, that’s fantastic-” she breathed, sitting up and tipping her head back.

“Yes-” Sebastian breathed, one broad hand squeezing her thigh, the other massaging her clit. He bucked up into her, eager for release.

 _You’d look gorgeous on my cock, Moran._ It was as if Carl was in the room with him, sneering against his ear.

Sebastian squeezed his eyes closed, shaking his head. “No-” he whispered, almost inaudible.

Miranda slowed, panting. “Are you okay?” she asked, stroking back his hair. “Do you want me to stop?”

“N-no, you feel great-” he promised, and she did, so why did he want to be sick? Why couldn’t he shut out the image of Carl in the showers, hurting him, forcing him to come?

Miranda was close, too, it seemed, her body rigid as she bucked down on him frantically. “More-” she begged, her head tipping back. She looked beautiful like that, letting go- and then Sebastian felt her pulse around him, which should have been more than enough to make him come as well, but...he didn’t.

“Oh, God, Sebastian- that was incredible-” she panted, leaning down to kiss him. He could feel her heart hammering wildly as their chests pressed together.

“Yeah-” he agreed. When Miranda had regained some of her composure, she moved back onto his cock, grinding slowly.

“What do you need, Seb? Let me give it to you,” she murred.

_You’re nothing but a gay slut._

“Actually, I’m okay,” he said, hands sliding to her hips, stilling her.

“Oh… are you sure? I can use my mouth, if you want,” she said, and grinned shyly. “You are absolutely incredible. Please let me return the favor.”

Sebastian felt awful. He pulled her down for a slow kiss. “I’m just tired,” he assured her. “I still had fun, I promise.”

His cock was already falling limp as she withdrew and moved to lie next to him. “Okay..” she said, trailing a finger over his chest, then looked up at him. “I really like you, Sebastian.”

He stroked her cheek. “I really like you too,” he whispered. Was Carl Powers going to ruin his sex drive on top of everything else? The fucking bastard.

“I should actually sleep, though,” he said.

“It’s only half past eight,” Miranda said in surprise.

“Yeah...I know, I’m a disgrace.” He kissed her again. “Thank you for coming over.”

“Of course.” Miranda’s touch was so kind, so warm. He didn’t deserve her. And she deserved someone who could fully reciprocate.

After she left, Sebastian tried to get off by himself, just to prove that he could. He had never, ever had a problem before. But he kept thinking of Carl, and worse, of Carl hurting Jim. How had Jim put up with that for seven months? How could Jim sleep after being hurt like that?

An unwilling image of Jim, naked and bent over, popped into Sebastian’s head, and he tried quickly to get rid of it, but his cock twitched and responded in his hand.

He arched his back and closed his eyes, not wanting to think of the fact that the idea of Jim naked was arousing. He grunted and turned, trying hard to imagine large-breasted women, all curves and lush lips, blonde or red hair- everything that Jim wasn’t.

But Jim popped back into his mind. Instead of being bent over, Sebastian was on his knees in front of Jim’s feet, touching himself as Jim’s pale fingers threaded through his hair.

 _There’s a good boy, Moran_. It was Jim’s voice in his head, vivid enough that Sebastian’s eyes snapped open in absolute horror.

He was on the brink, and he buried his face in his pillow, the thought of Jim watching in detached approval finally sending him over the edge.

“Fuck-” he breathed into his pillow, sagging from the release. “Fuck…”

What the actual hell was wrong with him? He wanted to blame Carl for this, and part of him did. But the other, more honest part of him, knew that he couldn’t. These vivid thoughts had nothing at all to do with Carl Powers, and everything to do with Jim Moriarty.  
__

Jim was absent the next day from lab. In his stead was a folded up note tucked into Sebastian’s textbook.

Sebastian opened it under his desk. There was just one line, written in Jim’s cramped, spidery hand:

_Art show is off. Don’t come._

What did Jim mean? His first instinct was to check the art room, to see if Jim was there. Was he feeling insecure about his painting? No….insecurity was never Jim’s problem. So what was it?

After class, Miranda caught him before he could run off. “Lunch is this way, remember?” she said teasingly, but there was an edge in her voice, almost a plea. Please don’t run off from me again.

Sebastian chewed his lip. Powers never missed lunch, which meant Jim was safe. He could investigate after Latin class. “Right, silly me,” he joked, and slid his arm around Miranda’s waist as they walked. “Are you nervous about the play?”

After Latin, Sebastian all but ran to the art room. He had checked his locker after lunch for other notes, other clues, but there was nothing, at least nothing he could see in the scant few seconds before class started.

The art room was empty. Jim’s painting was covered for the first time. Perhaps he always kept it covered when he wasn’t working on it. But wouldn’t it smudge? Sebastian stepped toward it and pulled the cloth up. He sucked in his breath, then yanked the cloth all the way to the floor.

Painted across the gorgeous masterpiece, in large, dripping yellow letters from a spray paint can, were the words “GAY FAG.”

Sebastian could only look at the words for a moment before he slung the cloth over the painting, his stomach rolling in disgust. Blind hatred flew through him. Powers would fucking pay. He didn’t care if Jim told him to wait. He wasn’t going to just fucking WAIT.

Sebastian knew where Powers would be at this time of day. Swimming season was just beginning, and he was in the middle of that busy transitional time of balancing both rugby and swim practice.

He was probably headed for the locker rooms now. Sebastian was barely aware of himself as he walked down the hall. He had only one thought in his mind, and that was to make Carl hurt, make him bleed.

He saw his large, square head down the hall, and he walked faster, bellowing an unearthly “HEY.”

That got Carl’s attention. He turned, and smirked as Sebastian came toward him, fists bared.

“Easy, Moran, no need to get-”

But he didn’t finish his sentence before Sebastian punched him full in the jaw with a sickening crunch. The rest came in flashes- hot, glorious rage, Carl’s blood on his hands…

When hands upon hands finally yanked Sebastian away, he had blood on his shirt, he vaguely realised. Carl was being helped up too. There was blood on the floor. Carl was handed an ice pack for his nose, which was where all the blood was coming from.

“You-broke my fucking nose-” Carl said thickly.

Good.

Like the last fight, it ended with them being sat down next to each other, only this time it was in front of the headmistress.

“Mr. Powers, your father is on the way in,” she said, then looked at Moran. “Your parents were unavailable, Mr. Moran.”

“I can’t say I’m surprised, Ms. Hancher,” Sebastian said dryly.

“That will be quite enough from you,” she said. “What on earth provoked such an attack?”

Carl shrugged, and gave a little sigh. “I-I don’t know. First he attacked me on the rugby pitch, then he just walked up to me in the hallway and decked me-”

“Bullshit,” Sebastian snarled. “Ms. Hancher, do you allow students to get away with hate crimes? Powers defaced a student’s art with slurs!”

“What are you talking about, Moran?” Carl said, shocked. “What art? What student? I have no idea what he means, Ms. Hancher, really!”

“Yes, Mr. Moran, tell me precisely what you mean,” she said impatiently.

Sebastian swallowed. “Jim Moriarty has been working on a painting in the art room. It was to be displayed tomorrow at a gallery. I came in looking for him, and it had been...defaced.”

“How exactly was it defaced, Mr. Moran?”

“It- it said ‘gay fag’ on it in huge letters,” Sebastian said, choking on the words. He couldn’t even look at Carl, worried that he would punch him again.

“Oh, please, you’re going to pin that on me?” Carl snorted. “I’m never in the art rooms. Ms. Hancher, I’ve barely even talked to Moriarty! How would I ever know that he’s working on some painting? Meanwhile, Moran here spends all science lab with him.”

“Enough. I want to see this piece of art before we sort through accusations,” the headmistress said. She rose from her desk and motioned for the boys to follow. “Stacy, show Mr. Anthony Powers into my office when he arrives, please. I will return shortly,” she told the office clerk, then turned to Sebastian. “Let’s see the painting, then.”

Sebastian’s stomach knotted as he led Carl and Ms. Hancher to the art wing, and into the classroom where he had confided in Jim, where Jim had seemed the most relaxed and happy. He pointed to the covered painting, unable to bear lifting it up himself, not wanting to see those words again.

Ms. Hancher lifted up the scrap sheet, her mouth drawn into a severe line as she looked over the graffiti. “I see,” she said at last, rather briskly. “Tell me, Mr. Moran, who can you think of that would have a motivation for doing this?”

Sebastian looked at Carl, whose expression was murderous, but also dangerously amused. Go on. I dare you. I have arsenal against you.

“Well, Powers is the obvious culprit,” Sebastian said calmly, staring him down. “He’s forever saying homophobic things, especially about Moriarty.”

“Please! Ms. Hancher, Sebastian bloody attacked me on the pitch at the last game. He can’t reign himself in. Clearly he has some problem with me. So he must have a problem with Moriarty. But I have nothing whatsoever to do with this!”

“Back to my office, the both of you,” she said, her expression unreadable.

Carl’s father was waiting when they returned. He was even more imposing than his son, although over the years he’d put on some weight around his middle. He stood, giving Sebastian a steady glare before his attention turned to the headmistress. “I’ll be frank, Ms. Hancher. I don’t know why you continue to let Sebastian Moran bully my son and others in your school. I enrolled my Carl here because this school had a reputation for discipline and a high priority on education.”

“I am very sorry, Mr. Powers, Moran’s insubordination was disciplined during the game. He was taken from the game, as you likely saw-”

“As was my son!” he snarled. “My son was punished for being targeted and victimised-”

Sebastian had to reign in a scoff out loud.

“I know all about this Moran’s reputation. He hasn’t stayed at a school for long, and he’s constantly picking on Carl.”

“That may well be, Mr. Powers, and I assure you, he will be disciplined accordingly, but the reason for this fight was that Moran has accused your son of defacing another student’s artwork with spray-painted homophobic slurs. I am taking this matter very seriously.”

“You have no proof that my Carl was in any way involved!” the senior Powers snarled. “He’s a star pupil and athlete, and this Moran boy is dragging him through the mud!”

Sebastian wanted to murder him. How would you like a broken nose to match your son’s? He thought viciously.

“My aim is to sort out the facts, Mr. Powers,” she said, with a calmness that Sebastian couldn’t help but admire. “I want to question each of the boys separately, and I wish to talk to James Moriarty as well.”

Sebastian swallowed. Moriarty wasn’t in school today at all, at least as far as he could tell. How had Carl known about the painting? And he wouldn’t tell Ms. Hancher anyway. But why not? So much for his “sainthood.”

“I’m not sitting around for that. Search his locker, or I’m withdrawing my son from this institution, and all of my money with it!” Mr. Powers demanded.

Ms. Hancher glared at him, rising. “Very well. If that’s what it takes to make progress, we’ll take a look, although I think there are more productive courses of action than this sort of invasive search.”

Sebastian felt a small bit of relief. There was nothing incriminating in his locker, anyway. Still, he didn’t relish the thought of Mr. Powers peering into his personal items.

“Go on and open it, Moran,” Ms. Hancher said when they reached his locker. Sebastian sighed and began on the combination. Then he remembered, with a sickly twinge in his stomach, that the flyer for the art gala was still in his locker. He could see it perfectly- it was sitting on top of his biology textbook, innocuous. Except the headmistress wouldn’t see it that way.

He turned the dial to the final number, thinking quickly. Could he grab it out before they saw? That would look even more suspicious. He would just have to pray that they somehow, miraculously, didn’t notice it-

When he opened his locker, he realised that the flyer wouldn’t be of any consequence after all. A can of yellow spray paint was tossed next to his rugby cleats, a dried trail of paint seeping from the lid.

“He planted it!” Sebastian said as Mr. Powers grabbed the can triumphantly.

“Oh my god, give it up, Moran!” Carl sneered. “Do you honestly expect anyone to believe that I somehow slipped a can of paint into your locker?”

Sebastian was speechless. How had he known his locker combination? It was the sort of thing that wouldn’t have surprised him at all if Jim had known, but awful, brick-headed Powers… except he wasn’t brick-headed...he was just good at acting like it.

“Mr. Moran, in my office, now,” Ms. Hancher said. “Mr. Powers, I would ask you to stay until I can speak with you and your son separately.”

“By all means,” Mr. Powers said. The venom in his voice had been replaced by oily charm.

Sebastian followed after Ms. Hancher, and even though Carl was silent, he could hear Carl’s horrible laugh echoing in his head. _I win, Moran. I always win._

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *albelaa means “charming one” in Urdu


	9. Pool

_Don't you try and pretend  
It's my feeling we'll win in the end_

**_"Don't You (Forget About Me)" - Simple Minds (1985)_ **

 

This was a bad dream. It had to be. The door to the office closed, and Sebastian sank into the chair on the opposite side of Ms. Hancher’s desk. Her face was grave.

“How do you explain this can of paint, Mr. Moran?” she asked.

Sebastian couldn’t. “Powers...he must have planted it.”

“How would he have your locker combination? Did you share it with him? Did you share it with anyone?”

Sebastian stared down at his knees. It didn’t make sense. “No- but he must have somehow found it- I never touched that paint can-”

“Mr. Moran, think about what you are saying. Does it make sense that someone like Carl Powers would go to the trouble of finding your locker combination, planting fake evidence, and letting himself get pummeled in the hallway, just to shame you?”

What could Sebastian say? When she said it like that, of course it sounded ludicrous. But what else could have happened?

The receptionist, Stacy, popped her head in. “Lord Moran said he would be here shortly,” she said, then flitted out.

Sebastian sank lower in his chair. He knew exactly what his father would do - He would murder him. On the spot.

“Mr. Moran, I really don’t know what to say,” Ms. Hancher snapped. “To write such a crass thing on a fellow student’s art. It’s absolutely deplorable, and we don’t tolerate hatred and unjust behaviour at this school.”

Sebastian couldn’t believe it. “So, Carl gets off the hook because his fucking _dad funded the bloody auditorium?_ And that’s not unjust?”

“There is no evidence against Carl Powers,” she said. “Frankly, Mr. Moran, your anger issues are alarming. You have attacked Powers with no understandable cause twice now, and hurt him quite seriously.”

“He’s a fucking BULLY. He’s abusive! He-”

“That will be quite enough, Sebastian,” she snapped. “You’re banned from the rugby team forthwith, and will have a one-week suspension. Be grateful that I am giving you such a light sentence.”

“ _What?_ ” Sebastian rose, gripping the back of his chair. “Ms. Hancher, he threatened me! Me, and my girlfriend, and Jim-”

He swallowed, realising how Jim’s name had tumbled from his mouth, with such...concern attached to it. “Is that so?” Ms. Hancher’s eyebrows shot up. “And if I brought in your girlfriend and Moriarty for questioning, they would corroborate this claim?”

He was saying too much. He didn’t want to implicate Jim in all of this any further, let alone bring Miranda into it. He hastily changed the subject. “I _know_ Carl Powers did this. I know he did. And if you can’t see it, then you can go fuck yourself,” he spat, then he whirled toward the door and stalked out, hurrying as he heard her shout after him, for him to come back.

He ran to the darkened outside, past the school grounds toward the bus stop. He was only adding days onto his suspension, only tacking on further ire from his father.

It was a cold, wet November afternoon, the sky dim. By the time Sebastian finally stopped inside the bus stop shelter, he was dripping and shivering from the rain. He didn’t have a plan - maybe he would just get on a bus and go somewhere. And never come back.

“So, you finally snapped, did you?” It was Jim’s voice, stepping in from the rain to face Sebastian. He had dark circles under his eyes, as if he hadn’t slept, but his eyes twinkled. “What finally did it, Moran?”

“I saw what Carl did to your painting,” Sebastian said hoarsely, and for a moment Jim’s confident expression flickered. Sebastian couldn’t begin to fathom how Jim’s mind worked, but he could only imagine how awful it must have felt to Jim to see his efforts destroyed with such disgusting hatred.

The expression only wavered for an instant, though, before Jim’s smirk returned. “Defending my honor? I’m touched.”

“As if you have any honor,” Sebastian shot back. “Not just for that. It was for everything. He deserved it all. He deserves worse.”

“Yes, he does,” Jim said complacently. “All in good time, Sebastian.”

It was rare that Jim said his first name, and when he did, Sebastian savored the way it dripped from Jim’s Irish tongue.

“I can’t believe he did that,” Sebastian said after a moment. “It was unforgivable. You spent so long on that painting.”

A muscle in Jim’s jaw tightened. “The only way he can make me fear him is to find a weakness in me. Destroying my art won’t change my resolve. Art can be remade. Ideas reconceptualised.”

Sebastian wanted to crawl into his words and take comfort there.

Jim opened his mouth, about to say something else, when the bus pulled up. “Is this you?” he asked.

“I don’t know. I don’t have anywhere specific to go.”

“Well, where do you want to go?” Jim drawled.

“Anywhere but home,” Sebastian said dryly.

“Let’s go, then.” Jim marched his way onto the bus, waiting for Sebastian to pay the fare for them both. They both automatically headed for the very back seat, the one facing the opposite way.

They kicked their dripping shoes on the railing and watched the street begin to move in front of them. The wet pavement looked like a river in the streetlamps, cars floating in it. Sebastian’s shoulder pressed against Jim’s, but Jim didn’t pull away, and neither did he.

“So, what happened?” Jim finally asked.

“I saw the painting, and then battered Carl until someone ripped us apart. Hancher got involved. I told her about the painting-”

“Why? You shouldn’t have done that,” Jim snapped.

“I’m sorry- I couldn’t stand it, the shit he wrote...Anyway, his father showed up, fucking _Anthony Powers,_ with all of his donated money and his entire, yell-until-you-get-your-way shit...”

Jim snorted.

“Anyway, he insisted they check my locker, and Carl must have...he must have gotten my fucking locker combination, God knows how the idiotic lug did _that_ , but when they searched my locker there was yellow spray paint inside.”

“Oh,” Jim said, and his voice actually sounded surprised for once. He fell into silence again.

“Anyway,” Sebastian continued wearily. “I’ve been kicked off the rugby team and I’m suspended for a week. Probably expelled, after I told Ms. Hancher to go fuck herself and walked out.”

“Oo!” Jim laughed, and Sebastian couldn’t help laughing too, feeling rather unhinged.

“Right- I’ve just fucked over my life! And he walks away scot-free!” Sebastian laughed, maniacal now. “I’m a fucking IDIOT!”

“I wouldn’t say you were a _complete_ idiot, Sebastian,” Jim said, the corner of his mouth quirking up. “Oh, I _do_ wish I could have been there to see you deck him in the hallway.” He hummed approvingly. “I’ll just have to watch it later.”

“Get stuffed. How?”

“Security cameras,” Jim all but yawned. “The school has them in all of the hallways, you know. And really, Sebastian, no more questions. Now, how long are we going to ride this bus? With your mad little outbursts, I don’t know if they’ll let us ride it on a continuous loop,” he said, amusement creeping into his voice.

Fuck, where _were_ they going? Sebastian peered out the window, trying to see their whereabouts. They were headed south, and they were already quite far from the well-to-do neighborhoods. Then Sebastian recognized a sporting gear shop where he’d been one weekend with some mates. “Oh!” He realised aloud. “We’re close to a pub I went to a while back. They don’t card.” The pub, he recalled, had pool tables and cheap beer. They could do worse.

__

The Silver Footman was even more dingy than Sebastian had remembered. To be fair, the last time he’d been here, he and his friends had already been quite tipsy from cheap lager. The pub hadn’t been updated from the 1980s, including, seemingly, its muisc. The tacky carpet, sticky wooden tables, one pool table, some crooked dart boards, and its few lone drunks hardly made it a cheery place, but Sebastian simply felt relieved to be somewhere that didn’t in any way resemble school.

It was quiet, and the bartender was only half-paying attention as Sebastian ordered two beers, drawing himself to his full height and ordering with a lower voice and a swaggering confidence. He felt a wave of victory as the bartender handed over two pints.

Jim was looking around with mild curiosity as Sebastian turned to hand him his beer. “I feel like we should be complaining about Thatcher or something,” he said with distant amusement.

Sebastian felt stupidly happy, taking a big sip of beer and finding a booth to sit in. His life was basically over, but for the moment, the recklessness had him feeling invincible.

Jim took a tiny sip of beer, watching Sebastian with those round, dark eyes. “You see what’s possible when you stop playing by _their_ rules and start listening to your own?” he said quietly.

Sebastian laughed, though his stomach turned nervously. “Now we really are in the eighties. Shouldn’t you have a safety pin through your nose? Say disparaging things about the queen, or something?”

Jim rolled his eyes. “I’m not a punk. I don’t belong in a social group.”

“Right, you’re _special,_ ” Sebastian sneered affectionately.

“Yes, I am,” Jim said, with an austere confidence that wiped the smirk from Sebastian’s face.

“How do you do that?” Sebastian asked, and Jim looked at him blankly. “How do you...how are you so powerful?”

Jim’s gaze was intense, hungry, and proud once more, but this time the pride seemed to be shared for Sebastian, and Sebastian felt like a cat being petted.

“You know, you’re more clever than you look, Sebastian. But don’t worry your pretty head about the _how._ Simply be grateful for being one of the few who recognises raw power when they see it.” Jim sipped his beer once more, looking around, then changed the subject. “Do you play pool?”

Sebastian looked back at the table. “Yeah. I like pool, actually.”

“Of course you do, competitive thing like you,” Jim smirked. “I bet you have a bloody table in your house, mm?”

Sebastian colored. How did Jim _know_ things like that? “Maybe,” he muttered. He had already drank half his beer. What he really wanted, he realised, was a cigarette.

Sebastian had never been one to carry a pack with him in his rucksack like many of his friends. He smoked when the mood struck him - and today was a day for cigarettes.

He excused himself, strode up to the bar, and bought a pack of cigarettes and another pint. He felt like a true adult now, a fully-grown man. He unwrapped the cellophane from the box and slid out a new cigarette, perfect and white. He swiped a packet of matches from the counter and returned to the booth.

“Let’s play a round,” Jim said lightly. “Twenty pounds says I trounce you.”

Sebastian couldn’t help but grin. “Pool shark, are you?”

“I’ve never played a game in my life.” Jim’s eyes were innocent. “How do you play?”

Sebastian considered him for a minute. “You want to bet me twenty quid that you’ll beat me in a game you’ve never played before?”

Jim’s grin was devilish. “Did I say twenty? Let’s make it fifty.”

“That’s an awful lot in a game between friends.” Sebastian put the cigarette between his lips and lit up, taking a slow drag. It felt good, putting something deadly into his lungs, breathing it out toward the smoke-stained ceiling. Dangerous. “Besides, you’ll win, won’t you? It’s all angles and maths, isn’t it?”

Jim was watching him with a strange look. It made Sebastian’s heart beat faster, the way Jim was devouring him with his eyes, tearing him apart, disseminating every inch.

“Friends. Is that what we are, Sebastian?” Jim asked. It wasn’t a question that Sebastian could answer, or was expected to answer. Jim got up from the table, abandoning his pint and sing-songing mockingly, “Friends, friends, friends!”

He grabbed a cue, examining it end to end, weighing it in his hand. He didn’t approach it like someone who had never played a game before. “Of course...if you’re scared, then the bet’s off.” His dark eyes flicked up to meet Sebastian’s. A challenge. Now there was no way that Sebastian could say no.

“I’m not scared,” Sebastian said automatically. “Fifty it is, then.”

“Tell me the rules,” Jim said, and his eyes were dark, large. Hungry. The way he always looked when he was absorbing new information.

Sebastian set up the balls in the triangle, lining them up. “We’ll play stripes and solids. Rules are simple enough. I’ll break, and then if any of the balls go into a pocket, that will determine whether I’m stripes or solids. When you sink a ball, you get another turn.”

Jim was circling the table, seemingly measuring up Sebastian. He sank down, looking at the felt at eye level, apparently looking for any bumps or divots. There were plenty. “If you sink the cue ball, it’s a scratch, and the other player gets to place the cue anywhere here,” Sebastian continued, drawing a line down the table with his finger. “Eight ball has to go in last, or the player loses. You also have to call which pocket the eight ball will go into before you sink it, otherwise it doesn’t count.”

Jim didn’t even seem to be paying attention, now seemingly fascinated by the eight ball itself, which he had picked up from its place in the triangle and weighed in his hand. “It rather looks like an inverse eye, don’t you think, Sebastian?” he mused quietly. He spun the ball between his pale, nimble fingers.

Sebastian was thrown for a loop. The bartender didn’t even glance their way. Some old Blur song played from the low-quality speakers. “Yeah, you loon. Put the ball back, or I’ll take that 50 now.” He realigned the balls and moved into place, bending over the table to make a clean break, the balls scattering across the felt. He didn’t sink any balls on the first go, but he wasn’t too concerned. “Right. Your go,” he said lightly, and moved back to sip his beer.

Jim circled the table, strategising. He finally set his sights on one ball in particular and bent over, fumbling with his cue a bit. “Be a lamb and help a bit?” he asked, looking over his shoulder at Sebastian.

“You want me to help you in a game that we’re playing for money? Get stuffed,” he grinned.

Jim’s gaze grew serious. “Helping me properly hold a pool cue is a trivial detail,” he said. “Are you really so scared? I thought we were _friends_ ,” he spat out the word with such disdainful mockery that Sebastian was tempted to forget the whole thing altogether. What was he doing here, anyway? What was he doing, trying to enjoy his time with Jim Moriarty, as if the odd boy really wanted anything to do with him?

Instead, he tucked his cigarette back into the corner of his mouth, taking his place behind Jim and covering Jim’s hand with his own. “You want your grip to be loose enough that the cue slides easily, but firm enough that you still have control,” he muttered, aware of how Jim’s body had arched back to meet his ever so slightly, a warm contact against his chest, his hips. It made his breath catch, and pulled every sensation to the forefront of his brain. He pulled back slightly, showing how to angle the cue. “Well, you get the idea,” he muttered, then stepped aside. His face felt hot as he retreated to his beer, taking a large swig, which only seemed to make his face grow warmer.

By the time he turned around, Jim had sank the eleven. “Right. Good,” Sebastian said, suppressing his surprise. He watched Jim’s slight shoulders bunch and then relax before he straightened, surveying the table. “You get another turn, remember,” Sebastian said.

Jim didn’t acknowledge him. He took his time, prowling around the table and surveying his options. He was stone-faced, all of his attention focused on the game. Nobody else in the pub was paying attention to the two teenage boys at the pool table, but Sebastian couldn’t understand how. Jim was magnetic, the way he focused, the way he became fully absorbed in his thoughts. Sebastian stared in astonishment as Jim sank another stripe with ease, then another, and another. He didn’t look back at Sebastian once as he rounded the table to bank two stripes in a tricky shock that made Sebastian swear under his breath.

Sebastian had only just finished his cigarette by the time Jim had zeroed in on the eight ball. “Left corner pocket,” Jim drawled quietly, boredly, bending to line up his shot. He was perfectly in line, and Sebastian knew with a mixture of shock, horror and...pride that Jim was about to play a perfect game of pool.

Except that Jim paused and looked over his shoulder at Sebastian, licking his lips. “Help a fellow out, won’t you, Moran?”

Sebastian was speechless, staring at Jim. Jim Moriarty didn’t need his help. He didn’t need anyone’s help to win. He swallowed thickly. “There’s no fucking way.”

“I’m going to win either way,” Jim said, confirming what Sebastian already knew. His eyes glinted, and he bent over the table just a degree further. The implication was clear. _I’ll either win by myself, or win with you draped over my body like a fucking victory cape._

Sebastian shouldn’t have been even tempted by this idea. He was straight, he had a girlfriend, and this was Jim Moriarty, for God’s sake.

And yet he found his body walking toward Jim as if pulled by an external force. He bent over him, his hand covering Jim’s on the cue as he lined up the shot. His other hand braced against the table, and he felt Jim’s back arch up to press against his chest. Their bodies were flush. The bartender was glaring at them, and Sebastian couldn’t bring himself to care, because Jim’s hips were pressed up against his-

“Make the shot,” Sebastian murmured, and Jim pressed back against Sebastian even more firmly, sinking the eight as his hips ground back-

Sebastian had to bite back a gasp, pulling back as he felt heat pooling- well, it didn’t matter where, because it was just a game of pool, and he wasn’t _supposed_ to feel this way- especially not after-

Jim straightened and turned to look at him, that same wide-eyed innocence in his eyes. It was so genuine that it took Sebastian by surprise. “Like that?” he asked, gesturing to the table of untouched solids.

Sebastian was lost for words. The song had ended and switched to “Don’t You Forget About Me.”  

“Best two out of three?” Sebastian stammered at last.

Jim wasn’t paying attention. He was, infuriatingly, humming along to the song, in a quiet little mutter:

_Tell me your troubles and doubts_

_Giving me everything inside and out and_

_Love’s strange so real in the dark-_

“Jim-” Sebastian snapped.

Jim stopped humming, chuckling mildly and brushing past him. “Did you ever see _The Breakfast Club_ , Moran? So funny, all those ‘troubled’ teens, coming together and talking about their feelings…” He flicked open Sebastian’s box of cigarettes and helped himself.

“Can’t say I have,” Sebastian said blankly. “I asked you if you wanted to try best two out of three.”

“I heard you.” Jim didn’t light the cigarette, just held it in his mouth, rolling it this way and that. “A rematch wouldn’t change the outcome, Sebastian.”

“I didn’t even get a _turn_ ,” Sebastian said in disbelief, then huffed and began to put the remaining balls away. “I’ll have to find a cash machine to pay you,” He muttered.

Jim, however, was setting up another game, the unlit cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth. “I’ll break this time,” he said. “If we tie, the bet’s off.” He looked Sebastian over, an appraising glance from head to foot. Sizing him up. And suddenly, Sebastian had everything to prove.

He felt his palm grow sweaty as he watched Jim break expertly, cleanly, and breathed a sigh of relief that he didn’t sink any balls on his first go.

Sebastian was up, and despite his nerves, he sank a solid and lined up for another shot. This was idiotic- he had never played a perfect run before. There were so many factors to consider, and that was with a perfect table. This table was _shit,_ the felt all gouged. He felt Jim’s eyes on him as he sank a second ball, then, miraculously, a third. Sebastian had never felt such pressure. All of his concentration went into the game, his whole body tensed, each shot a test.

And so far, he was passing. He could scarcely breathe when he sank the final solid, moving to line up for the eight ball. He would have to bank it. He shook out his hands, wiping sweat on his trousers. He felt Jim slide up next to him, a warm hand on the small of his back. “Go on, Sebastian,” Jim drawled. “ _Make the shot._ ”

A hot jolt of undeniable arousal ran down Sebastian’s spine, settling underneath that warm hand and blooming lower. He could barely focus on what he was doing, and he couldn’t explain it, how the eight ball went in, how he had just played a perfect game of pool on the shittiest table in London, how despite all of this, the only thing he could focus on was the feeling of Jim’s hand on the small of his back.

He straightened and stared at the table. It was taking every ounce of control not to press against Jim’s warm touch. “I’ve never done that before,” he admitted softly. He could feel Jim’s eyes on him, even with his back turned.

“Yes, I know. And you did it for me,” Jim said. And fuck, he was right. Sebastian’s eyes closed. Jim wasn’t touching him, but he could feel Jim’s entire body regardless. He had punched Carl in the face for Jim. Had gotten suspended for Jim. Had played the best game of pool in his life to prove himself worthy of Jim. Sebastian was shaking, unable to process what this all meant.

“I should go home-” he said finally, hoarsely. When he turned back to Jim, he could barely meet Jim’s eyes, afraid of what would happen if he did. The entire pub must already be staring at them, wondering when the two homos were going to leave.

“The bet-” Sebastian said, but Jim’s mouth flickered.

“Save your cash, Moran. You’ll need it long before I do. We’ll call it a tie.” The flat disappointment in Jim’s voice was obvious, and fell like a dull weight to the ground.

Sebastian realised with horror that now, because of whatever had just happened at that pool table, there was a new awkwardness between them.

"I got a bit caught up in the game back there,” he said, forcing a laugh as they moved outside. The rain had slowed to a light drizzle, and Sebastian headed for the bus stop.

Jim followed him mutely until they were in the bus shelter. He didn’t say anything for a moment, turning to look out at the traffic. “Don’t you dare try to tell me that what happened back there was a mistake because you’re too afraid to admit who you really are. I was there. I _felt_ you,” he said vehemently.

Sebastian felt the wind knocked out of him. “Powers was- I didn’t want what Powers...did to me, and I still got…” He winced. “It’s not always so simple.”

“Bullshit,” Jim whirled to face Sebastian. He looked as if he wanted to destroy Sebastian, his gaze burning a hole straight through him. “I didn’t _force_ you into anything. So don’t you _ever_ compare me to that piece of shit-”

“Jim, I didn’t mean-”

But Jim kept going. “If you’re using _him_ as an excuse for what just happened, then I really don’t know why I wasted any time on you at all.”

The bus pulled up to the kerb, but Sebastian wasn’t going to get on. Not yet. “I don’t know what happened,” he said quietly. “I’m not blaming you.”

“Really? Because that would be so convenient, wouldn’t it? Blame anything that happened on crazy, slutty Jim, so you can go back to your macho, false, lying-”

Sebastian shook his head, staring Jim square in the eye. “I don’t want to be- I _can’t_ be that anymore,” he said. It was the closest he’d come to admitting that, yes, there had been something there. Not just the moment when Jim’s hand had slid over his back, but in the art room, kneeling in supplication at Jim’s feet, and in the classroom, watching the nape of Jim’s neck. There had always been something. Sebastian felt free. He also felt a bit dizzy.

Jim still looked angry, but he wasn’t leaving, and he wasn’t shutting Sebastian out just yet. “Look, Jim, I owe you...big time. I owe you for the rugby strategies, and for the pig dissection, and now I owe you fifty quid-”

“Oh, you’ll repay me, Sebastian Moran. Don’t you worry a second about that,” Jim purred, a slow smile on his face. “Although...I may have one more favor for you. It’s not about you, of course, but I think you’ll like it.”

“Whatever you’re planning with Powers?” Sebastian asked.

Jim shrugged. “Perhaps.”

Sebastian licked his lips. Then tension had dissipated somewhat, but it was still there, a kettle over low heat, not quite ready to whistle. “Can I ask you for one more favor, Jim?” he asked.

Jim tsked impatiently. “You can always ask, Moran, but it doesn’t mean the favor will be granted. What is it?”

“Can I have your phone number?” It was worth mustering up the courage to ask, just to see the rare astonishment on Jim’s face. “It’s only...I’m suspended from school for the week. And it would be nice to...it would be nice to talk to you,” Sebastian said.

Jim sauntered up to him, slowly, until their chests were nearly brushing. Sebastian couldn’t breathe. What would happen, if he just leaned forward and-?

Jim pulled away and grabbed a notebook and pencil from his rucksack, scribbling a row of numbers and ripping off the scrap. “I don’t usually give my number away for free,” Jim said.

“I’ll try not to make you regret it,” Sebastian said. His blood boiled at the thought of Powers taking this, of having something so precious and bruising it.

“I won’t. Because I’m not giving it away for free,” Jim said, his eyes sliding up Sebastian’s chest, resting on his throat, then his mouth. Sebastian opened his mouth to ask what he meant, but the next bus was pulling up, and Jim’s eyes flicked up to Sebastian’s. “Go,” he ordered. And Sebastian did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was one of my favorite chapters to write, so I'm excited to post it!! I hope you enjoyed it, too. :)


	10. Phone Calls

****_Surprise, surprise_   
_The boys are home_   
_My guardian angel_   
_Run down my telephone_

_**"Teenage Dream" - T. Rex (1974)** _

 

 ****Jim walked home, even though it was over two miles, even though the cold night air blew through his threadbare coat. He didn’t even notice. His Moran...working so hard for him. Jim indulged himself on his walk, imagining if Moran had been there for him before all of this...if he’d had him as his guard dog before Powers had become an issue, before he’d sworn off the notion of friends entirely.

Even now, he was being foolish. The cloud he’d been floating on dissipated, and Jim was walking on cold concrete again, and fury at his own weakness flooded him. He had been so bloody eager, pressing back against Sebastian when his delicious weight had draped over him. _Like the whore you are,_ Powers would say. Jim hissed. Powers had no right to be in his head. Moran, though...he could find a place for him. Tuck him into a little space, where he could pace back and forth, all feral energy and barely-closeted fury.

His mouth twitched up as he imagined Sebastian whaling on Powers, splitting his stupid, brickish face in half with his fists. His pretty beast.

__

Lord August Moran was waiting in the foyer, drawn up to his full six-foot-two-inch stature. His pale eyes flashed dangerously, strong jaw clenched, mouth a thin line.

Sebastian’s wet trainers squeaked on the perfect tile floor when he came in the door. “Evening, father,” he muttered.

“What the HELL is wrong with you?” August rumbled, grabbing Sebastian’s arm. “Have you come COMPLETELY unhinged? After all that we’ve done for you- you repay it with defiance and the most idiotic decisions imaginable!”  He drew closer, and fury split his face apart. “You smell like _cigarettes and alcohol_!”

“If this is about Carl Powers-”

“You’re bloody well right, it’s about Powers-” he hissed. “I come home to news that you’ve been suspended _and_ kicked off the rugby team! It’s bloody France all over again-”

“I didn’t put anyone in a coma, for fuck’s sake. And he started it-” Sebastian snapped, growing hot with rage. If his father only knew- not that he would ever, ever tell him-

“I don’t care if he did! You’re not supposed to lose your _bloody temper!_ ” August barked.

“Sort of like what you’re doing now, you mean?” Sebastian snapped back.

August’s hand flew out so quickly that Sebastian didn’t know what was happening until the sound of the smack reverberated in the foyer. The force of it cracked Sebastian’s face to the side.

August looked surprised as well, pulling his hands back to his sides.  “You’re not to leave the house during your suspension,” he said in a low growl that was far worse than his shouting. “I’ve given Sana a list of rules, and there will be no bending them. You will keep up with all of your coursework. You will finish your term with top marks. And when you’re done, you’re going to correctional school to finish out your schooling.”

Sebastian clutched his aching face and swallowed, refusing to look at August. “What do you mean, finish out?” he whispered fearfully. “What about university?” He hadn’t exactly had a field of study in mind, but he’d always dreamed of studying a language, joining a uni society, living in a dorm or a shit apartment, having his own freedom-

“You need discipline,” August said sharply. “Discipline I can’t provide you on my own. You will serve a term in the military. After that, if you still want to go to uni, maybe we can talk.”

“I’ll be eighteen in May,” Sebastian said, astonished at how calm he was. “I’ll be a legal adult. You can’t mandate me into the military.”

August’s stare was icy. “See how you get by with no funds. Now enough talking, it makes me sick to even look at you. Go upstairs.”

Sebastian couldn’t move, he was so furious. How dare he. How fucking _dare_ he plot out the course of his life!  

“GO,” August barked.

Sebastian kicked off his shoes and stalked upstairs to his room. He slammed the door, coming face to face with Kurt Cobain. An actual dead man. His fist closed on the scrap of paper holding Jim’s phone number. Thank God he’d asked for it when he did, because he wouldn’t be seeing Jim anytime soon.

__

It was so odd, not going to school the next day. _At least I get to sleep in,_ Sebastian thought when his usual alarm went off, but he only got ten extra minutes before Sana came in, pulling up his shades. “Time to get up, mister. There’s work to be done.”

“Sana, I don’t know if you heard, but I’ve been suspended,” Sebastian groaned, covering his head with the pillow. He’d slept fitfully all night, images of Jim and Carl and his father’s livid face all blurring together until he was unable to distinguish between waking thoughts and dreams.

“Oh, I heard, all right,” Sana said, ire in her voice as she ripped the blankets back. “How could I not have heard? You told the headmistress off? You punched a boy in the hallway?”

“He was committing a hate crime,” Sebastian muttered.

“You have an odd way of showing nobility, _g_ _aandu_ ,” Sana spat.

Sebastian winced at the insult. She only called him such names when she was really and truly upset. That made him infinitely more sad and ashamed than his father’s wrath.

“Now up. You are to help me wash the windows today, and your father wants you to keep with your exercise schedule. Come. Work out that anger on some window smudges, then you can run the rest out.”

The entire day was like that, and in other circumstances it might have been nice, having the whole day with Sana, but she was so furious at him that Sebastian spent most of it in stony silence; scrubbing windows, then working out, then picking up sticks and stones in the back garden.

Sebastian got a phone call right after school. He was almost hoping it was Jim, but it was Miranda. He ran upstairs to answer the hallway phone, then walked into his room for privacy.

“‘Bastian?” she asked.

Sebastian felt a bigger distance between them than just the phone. He didn’t want to talk to her. There was no way to explain… “What the hell happened?” she continued.

“Miranda…” he sighed, sinking onto his bed. “Just forget it. Okay? My father’s pulling me out of school at the end of the term.”

“ _What_? But your suspension is only for a few days.”

“This isn’t the first time I’ve hurt someone,” Sebastian mumbled.

“Oh, please, Sebastian, Powers was hardly hurt-”

But Sebastian barreled on. “When I was in France, I put a boy in a coma,”  he burst out.

There was silence on the other end of the line, and Sebastian felt a sick satisfaction from it. _That’s right, your boyfriend is a freak. Your boyfriend went hunting and shot a deer and watched it suffer and enjoyed it. Your boyfriend is no better than that psychopath Moriarty who disturbs you. Oh, and your boyfriend might have been flirting with that very same psychopath._

“Well, sometimes you don’t know your own strength,” she said after a moment.

“Or sometimes people are just monsters,” he said, and there was no bitterness in his voice now. It was matter-of-fact.

Miranda paused for just a second too long. “You’re not a monster, Sebastian,” she said quietly.

“I am. I loved punching Carl in the face. I could have killed him. The only reason I didn’t was because-”

_Was because Jim had told me not to. Jim has dibs._

Aloud, though, he said, “-because of the consequences.”

“I hate him too, Seb,” Miranda sighed. “But we have to rise above him.”

“You sound like my fucking dad,” he growled.

“I’m not trying to criticise. I just....I don’t want you getting into any more trouble.”

Sebastian stood up and began to pace. “Didn’t you hear me? I’m being pulled out of school next month! It’s over! Even if I keep my head down now, even if I do a good job and get everything right, it’s still over.” His fingers trailed over his large CD collection. He certainly wouldn’t be able to haul all of his CDs to reformatory school.

Miranda was silent for a bit. “You could come over here a bit. We could...talk. Take your mind off things.”

“We could fuck, you mean?” Sebastian said harshly. “I can’t. I’m under house arrest all week.”

Miranda scoffed, offended. “Will they let you out to come see the play, at least?” she asked.

“I doubt it. And really, to be honest, your play is the last of my worries right now.”

“Well, apologies for even asking,” she said, and Sebastian could hear emotion thickening her voice. “I really don’t know what’s gotten into you.”

“Bye, Miranda,” he said flatly.

“See you next week,” she replied, her voice cold, then slammed the receiver down. That was the last time they spoke on the phone that week.

Sana had to go in and pick up Sebastian’s coursework each day. For Sebastian, each day felt longer than the last. Nobody from the rugby team called him. Not even Barnes. Sebastian wondered what Carl had told him.

Sebastian’s days were dull, and gloomy. Every day was a litany of yard work, homework, and exercise. He practiced his Urdu with Sana, he watched TV, he blared music in his bedroom. And at night, he curled in on himself, his mind drifting from his usual fantasies or simple images into bolder ideas. It was his own head...nobody needed to know that he fantasized about Jim Moriarty now when he wanked off.

He didn’t know what it would feel like, to have sex with a man. In his fantasies, though, Jim showed him exactly what to do- barked commands, praised him. And God, just the thought of that- of giving in to that grinning, devious boy- made him come with embarrassing speed.

He didn’t work up the nerve to call Jim Moriarty until three days after their game of pool. When he finally did, he curled against the windowsill in his bedroom, his palms sweaty.

A woman answered the phone, sounding irritated. When Sebastian asked for Jim, she sounded puzzled, and Sebastian began to worry that he’d gotten the number wrong. Then there was a rustle, and Sebastian heard her yell “JAMES! Telephone’s for you!” She had an unmistakable Londoner accent- not Irish at all.

There was the sound of a baby crying, a TV blaring, and then- “Hullo, Sebastian,” Jim said in a soft sing-song. Sebastian could hear him breathing down the crackling receiver. “Enjoying your holiday?”

“It’s not a bloody holiday, and you know it,” Sebastian snarled. “What’s Carl been like?”

“His usual arrogant self,” Jim replied, sounding bored.

“Jim, has he hurt you?” Sebastian demanded.

“He hasn’t touched me,” Jim promised. “And he will be dealt with. Don’t worry your pretty head about that, Moran. You’ll be allowed back at school for the next swim meet, yes?”

“As far as I know.”

“I think you should go. Powers is an incredible athlete to watch. So majestic, if the newspapers from the last swimming season are to be believed.”

There was more rustling and the background noise faded slightly. “Hang on.” Jim must have trailed into another room, taking the phone with him. Sure enough, the sound of a door closing followed after. “You’ve been thinking about me,” Jim said.

Sebastian’s face reddened. “Yes,” he said, his voice quiet, guilty. “You’re right. As always.”

Jim’s soft, intimate laugh made the hairs at the nape of Sebastian’s neck stand up straight. “What, precisely, were you thinking about?”

Sebastian swallowed, leaned his forehead against the glass. He idly rolled the phone cord around his finger. “About our game of pool,” he managed out. “About how…”

“About your scary gay feelings,” Jim snickered.

When Jim said it aloud, it made it so much more real. And, ironically, far less scary. But still… “I have a girlfriend, Jim,” he said.

“Yes, and you’re not on the phone with her right now,” Jim said lightly. “And you weren’t thinking of her, you were thinking of me. I was thinking of you too, Sebastian.”

Sebastian’s heart hammered, his stomach twisting pleasantly. “You were?”

“The thing about Carl is, he likes to gossip. And he seems to have a bit of an obsession with you.” Sebastian could almost hear the smirk in Jim’s voice. “And the size of your cock.”

Sebastian reddened. He didn’t want Jim’s ideas about him coming from Carl. “Jim-” he muttered.

“Has anyone ever sucked you off before, Sebastian?”

Sebastian’s hand shook. What if someone was listening on the other line? He bit his lip, shifting as he felt blood rush to his cock. “Yes,” he said quietly.

“Has anyone ever been able to swallow you whole, given you that deep kind of suck that made your eyes roll back?” Jim asked wickedly.

Jesus fucking Christ. Sebastian had to shift the receiver away from his mouth so that he didn’t audibly moan into the phone. He could feel his face growing hot. “Jim- I should really-”

“You’re not going to hang up on me, Sebastian,” Jim snarled. “Don’t even think about it.”

Sebastian knew his heavy breathing carried to the other line anyway.

“There’s a good boy,” Jim purred, and Sebastian’s legs widened minutely on the windowsill. “Now, give me your phone number.”

Sebastian recited it off breathlessly.

“Now, as much as I would love to stay on the phone and listen to the noise you make when you come, Sebastian, I’m not going to do that. But I want you to imagine me sucking you off when you get off this phone call. Will you do that?”

“Yes-” Sebastian said, in a strangled voice.

“Great! Let’s chat again sometime! It’s been so lovely catching up,” Jim said in a perky voice, and the background noise grew louder once more.

“Uh-” Sebastian could only gasp, before Jim hung up.

Sebastian was unbearably hard. He drew down his window shade, made sure the door was locked, and masturbated. He pictured Jim on his knees, his dark eyes looking up and demanding Sebastian’s full attention as he sucked around him. He imagined that quick tongue over the head of his cock- maybe his hand would fondle Sebastian’s balls, or squeeze his thighs. He imagined Jim’s noises, small moans of arousal - Jim’s body between his thighs, wet heat on his cock-

He had to bury his face in his arm as he came, to swallow the desperate, choked noise he made. The effort left him spent and trembling, leaning uncomfortably back against the wall as his head tipped back.

__

Sebastian was quiet that night at dinner. Jim Moriarty had been thinking of him. Sexually. Imagining his cock. Imagining sucking his cock. The thought was almost too much to handle, and Sebastian had to hurriedly excuse himself from the table for another quick wank. His body was insatiable now, filled with a heat that wouldn’t go away.

The next few days were torture. Sana actually asked if he was ill the following morning, because he looked so flushed and tired. He just hurriedly shook his head and ran several extra miles during his workout time.

On Friday evening, Sana found Sebastian. “There’s a boy on the phone for you,” she said. “He had some questions for you about a biology project.”

Sebastian’s stomach did a backflip. “Yeah, that must be my lab partner. Lab’s finishing up, and there’s the final paper. My books are in my room. I’ll get the phone up there,” he babbled, then all but ran upstairs to answer the phone.

Jim’s breath was heavy. His home, wherever he lived, seemed to be quiet. “Are you alone?”

Sebastian lay on his bed, phone in hand. “Yeah.”

“Would you kill someone if I asked you to, Sebastian?”

Sebastian rolled onto his side. “That’s a hell of a question, Jim,” he said lowly. Jim’s breath was heavy with...desire? “Hang on...Jim, are you...wanking off right now?” he asked, equal parts shocked and aroused.

“What do you think, Moran? It’s not often I get the flat to myself…”

He pictured Jim on his back, on a bed like Sebastian was, slender body arching off the bed, hand fisting his cock, face flushed - God. “Where’s your flat?” Sebastian asked, his mouth dry, asking the question in a desperate attempt to keep himself sane.

“It doesn’t matter. I’m only here for now. Hard to get attached to foster families,” Jim said distantly. “Anyway, I didn’t call for small talk. Life’s too short. Answer the question, Basher.”

Sebastian bit his lip at his rugby nickname. It sounded so different coming from Jim’s mouth. “God, Jim, this is fucking...weird.”

Jim huffed impatiently, his breath crackling into the receiver like a crashing wave. “If you want normalcy, stop associating with me _now._ I’ll hang up-”

“No!” Sebastian said, hand tightening on the phone. “I- if I was guaranteed not to get caught...yeah. Yeah, I think I would. But please fucking tell me that’s a rhetorical question, Jim.”

“For now,” Jim said, and then he swore softly, under his breath. “Sebastian-”

“Yes?” Sebastian asked, closing his eyes, listening to Jim’s breath.

“Touch yourself for me,” Jim murmured.

“Yes-” Sebastian’s hands were already sliding to unzip his jeans, and he was stroking himself into hardness. It only took a second- and he doubted it would take very much longer before he came. “Jim, I can’t stop thinking about you,” he admitted breathlessly.

“I know,” Jim laughed softly, intimately, and for a moment it was like he was there with him, and Sebastian didn’t know if it was his isolation or just being so ungodly horny, but he could feel Jim’s breath against his neck, his pale fingers sliding around his torso. “You know, Sebastian, I had a dream about you,” Jim snickered.

God. Sebastian kept his eyes closed, imagining having Jim on the bed with him.

“It was such an _ordinary_ dream, really. I don’t have sex dreams, usually. Not ones where someone like you comes along, bends me over a desk, and fucks me into next week.”

“Jesus Christ-” Sebastian choked out.

“But that’s exactly what happened.” Jim’s voice was so casual, conversational, except for his labored breathing. He laughed, an edge of mania there. “Would it be as good in real life, Sebastian? Would your cock split me open? Would you make me see stars?”

“I don’t- I’ve never-”

“Isn’t it funny, how they always say you see stars when you’re in pain? And stars are my favorite things to see. I’m absolutely mad for astronomy,” Jim said, panting. “I’ve always been on the receiving end, Sebastian, but I can tell you how deliciously tight it would be. Once you’re inside- it would be the best feeling in the world.”

Sebastian bit his lip. Jim’s back arching, Jim’s muscles tightening-

“God, Jim, I’m close-” Sebastian gasped, squirming against the bed.

“Not yet, pet,” Jim breathed quietly. “You know, people always think that if you’re getting fucked, you’re the weak one. It’s not true. You would be mine, you know?” Jim’s voice was a low purr, slow, consonants feeling close and intimate. His voice dripped sex. Sebastian’s toes curled, and he had to stop for a moment, squeezing the base of his cock to keep from coming.

“F-fuck-”

“Maybe I’d just tie you down and fuck myself down on your cock, take what I want, and leave you begging to finish…”

A small whimper escaped through Sebastian’s nose, which resulted in a low laugh from Jim’s end. “I want to see you come undone, Moran. I want to push you to your limits until you’re in tears. Slap you until you’re red and aching, make you scream my name-”

“Jim, please-” Sebastian begged, barely able to stand it.

Jim paused his monologue for a moment, and it was just shared breath over the phone line. “Come for me, Sebastian,” he finally said, his voice choked too, and just _hearing_ Jim in that state had Sebastian coming hard into his hand, mouth open and hot against the bed, groaning against the phone. He could hear the crash of Jim’s breath on the phone as well, then a small, contained noise, something brief and intimate. Then a soft sigh of relief. It was like that for a few more minutes - shared, heavy breath that slowly quieted.

“Mmm... there’s a good boy,” Jim murmured at last. “It’s a shame, really, that you’re confined to the house. No chance of sneaking out?”

“No. Housekeeper has her eyes on me. All the time,” Sebastian said, his head feeling pleasantly light. “God, Jim, I can’t believe we just-”

“Had phone sex?” Jim laughed. “First time for everything, Sebastian. Even for me, I suppose,” he mused.

“I wish I could sneak out- maybe later, I could-”

“No need to add years onto your sentence, Moran,” Jim said, his bored tone edging slowly back into his voice. “I need you back at school at your scheduled return. You can have a bit of fortitude until then. Oh, and by the by, we did get top marks on our pig dissection project.”

Sebastian laughed, grinning wide. “Good. Clearly that’s my top priority right now.”

“Lovely, isn’t it, how a large part of our grade depends on a dead animal?” Jim hummed, then his voice changed, business-like. “When you return to school, keep it reigned in. Whatever Carl does, don’t retaliate. _Whatever_ he does, Sebastian. I can guarantee that he won’t touch me. Can you keep from bashing his head in for a few days?”

“God, I hope so,” Sebastian muttered.

“Don’t get me wrong, it would be so fun to watch. I’m tempted, Sebastian, I’m very tempted. But leave it in my hands. That’s all I ask.”

“Right...what are you going to do?”

“Getting greedy, Moran. Patience,” he sang tauntingly. “Now, I really must fly.”

“Jim, wait-” Sebastian said, zipping up his trousers and sitting up on the bed.

Jim said nothing, but he didn’t hang up either.

“How...how do I..?” What was he trying to say? _How do I continue now that I know exactly how much I want you? How do I live my life with this new discovery?_

But he didn’t need to finish his sentence. “You keep ignoring me at school. Try to resist putting your hands all over me,” Jim snickered.

Sebastian scoffed, rolling his eyes.

“And you leave yourself open to possibility, and stop putting yourself in the square little box that everyone has tried to stuff you in,” Jim added simply. “Now, ta-ta!” He said cheerily, then slammed the phone down.

Sebastian sat listening to the dialtone, unable to move for a bit. He felt a wave of exhilaration, but it was immediately followed by guilt. He’d had a chance to really patch things up with Miranda...then he’d done this. He’d cheated on her. Should he tell her? Could he, even if he wanted to? Did it even matter, if he was leaving in a few weeks anyway?

A rap at the door made him jolt to his feet, doing up his jeans.

“Sebastian, are you quite done on the phone? There’s still work to be done,” Sana called through the wood.

“Y-yeah. Be right down,” Sebastian said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gaandu is Hindi for “born from an ass.” Sana only ever swears in Hindi. ;)


	11. Swim Meet

_And if the ground's not cold_   
_Everything is gonna burn_   
_We'll all take turns, I'll get mine too_

**_"Monkey Gone to Heaven" - Pixies (1989)_ **

 

As restless as he was from staying at home, Sebastian was dreading going back to school. And even though he’d run over every scenario in his head, stepping back into those corridors was just as bad as he’d feared.

Everyone was staring at him. Fucking _everyone_ , including younger students he’d never even seen before. He kept his head down and his hands in his jacket pockets, hunching his shoulders as much as possible.

He spotted Barnes and tried to give him a smile, but Barnes looked straight past him. Sebastian glared daggers at Barnes’ back once he’d passed. If it wasn’t for Jim, he wouldn’t have anything left at this fucking school to care about. If it wasn’t for Jim, he wouldn’t be in this mess in the first place.

He cringed as he neared his locker, half-expecting it to be defaced with gay slurs, but Carl wouldn’t be that idiotic. It looked the same as ever. A note was pushed into the one of the vents. He unwrapped it hastily, and felt disappointed when he saw it was Miranda’s loping cursive, not Jim’s cramped spider scrawl.

_Can we talk? Let’s meet after school, at the cafe across the street. After all the craziness, I don’t know what to think. -M_

Was she referring to Sebastian’s craziness, or had further things happened? God, what had people been saying about him? It must have been awful, because nobody was talking to him. People must know that he’d told the headmistresses to go fuck herself, they must know about the graffiti, about getting kicked off the rugby team...

He was in such a fog that he hadn’t even thought about what it would be like to see Jim after their strange hiatus until he walked into the biology classroom. Jim was sitting innocently at their lab table, shirt tail peeking out from the hem of his jumper, dark hair mussed against pale skin. How the actual fuck was Sebastian supposed to sit next to him as if everything was normal? As if he wanted to do anything other than touch him?

Jim, however, just looked up mildly as Sebastian came in, his gaze lingering on him for a brief second. “Welcome back,” he murmured.

Ms. Beauchamp, bless her, didn’t make a big fuss over Sebastian being back, other than a quiet, “Thank you for keeping up with your coursework during your absence, Mr. Moran. Moriarty can catch you up. We’re on to the nervous system unit. Chapter eight.”

The class was a lecture, so Sebastian and Jim had to sit straight forward, taking notes. Sebastian’s notes weren’t very coherent. Every time his forearm brushed against Jim or he heard Jim make a slight exhale, he would think of their phone conversations, and he would squirm in his chair. It was rather pathetic, as if he was twelve again and sex was beginning to sound interesting for the first time. Toward the end of class he scribbled on the edge of his notebook, “What have people been saying about me?” He slid it over to Jim.

Jim’s mouth quirked up and he wrote back, “Vanity, Sebastian, will get you nowhere.”

Sebastian ribbed him with his elbow lightly, then he saw that Miranda had turned in her chair and was looking back at him. It wasn’t an affectionate look. It was peculiar. Anxious.

After class, he dutifully caught her in the hallway. “Hi,” she said, somewhat stiffly.

“Hey. I missed you,” he said, moving in to kiss her. She turned her face so he caught her cheek instead.

“Did you?” she asked.

Sebastian was lost for words.

Miranda looked past him and blew out a long sigh. “Are we on for after school?”

“Yes. Of course,” he promised. “Miranda, I’m sorry I was distant while I was home. I didn’t...I didn’t know what to say.”

She shifted her rucksack from one shoulder to the other. “You weren’t distant. You were rude. But we’ll talk after school,” she said, then turned and left.

Sebastian didn’t follow her to the canteen. He obviously wasn’t going to be welcome at her table. She and her drama friends would all be sharing stories about _Frankenstein_ , anyway- the show that he’d promised to attend with flowers. And he wasn’t about to go in and face Carl. Whatever Jim had commanded him, Sebastian would march up to him and punch him again if he got half a chance.

Instead, he spent his lunch hour in the library, staring at a book without reading it, his headphones on full blast. His mind kept drifting back to Miranda. She’d looked so uncomfortable outside of biology. What had she heard? Some illogical, panicked part of Sebastian wondered if she knew. If somehow, she knew what he and Jim had done. What would he tell her if she did? He had cheated on her, and there was no getting around that. But, a dark voice in his head said, it had been worth it. Jim hadn’t even touched him, and Sebastian had felt something undeniably intense. Even now, racked with guilt, he only wanted more.

He was just as distracted in his afternoon classes. His stomach rumbled loudly by mid-afternoon, protesting the absence of lunch to digest. Sebastian sped to the cafe after classes were over, ordering two sandwiches and wolfing one of them down before Miranda arrived. He had ordered coffee for them both, and he slid one towards her when she came in. She was smiling nervously. Was she afraid? Or simply disgusted with him?

She sat down, unsmiling. Sebastian vaguely wondered if this was her “I’m-about-to-break-up-with-you-face.” He wouldn’t be surprised. He deserved it.

“Sebastian…”

He slid her coffee toward her. “Miranda, I want to say that I’m sorry. I know I treated you like shit this week. And I missed your play...how did it go?”

She smiled weakly into her cup, fingernails tapping against the ceramic lightly. She didn’t answer for a while, but finally said, “Are you really leaving at the end of term?” Her brown eyes met Sebastian’s.

“Well, yeah. My father never lies,” Sebastian murmured.

There was an uncomfortable silence. Sebastian sipped his coffee. Miranda stared into hers, not drinking. “Are you okay?” Sebastian asked.

“Yeah. No. ...I really liked you Sebastian,” she whispered, looking down.

“Liked? As in, used to like?”

She shook her head, hurriedly wiping her face. Oh God, she was actually crying. “Oh, umm…” He handed her a fistful of paper napkins. “Do you want to leave?”

“No, I’m fine,” she muttered, blotting under her eyes carefully.

“Miranda, what did you mean, all this craziness? What happened while I was gone?”

She sighed, gulping down some coffee. “I don’t know, Sebastian. Rumors.”

“What are people saying?” Sebastian’s heart hammered. “Please, don’t try to spare my feelings. Just tell me.”

Miranda winced. “That you’re...a self-hating gay man. That you probably got kicked out of your old school because you...raped all the boys there. Just complete rubbish.”

“Exactly, rubbish,” Sebastian snarled. “I didn’t touch Carl Powers, I would never dream of touching him.”

“Of course you wouldn’t. But...why did you have that spray paint in your locker?”

Sebastian was so sick of defending himself. “I don’t know it got there, but I didn’t put it there,” he said wearily.

Miranda didn’t say anything.

“Is that all? That I’m a gay rapist and wrote hate slander on Moriarty’s art project?”

  
She paused, then said, “Well...people say you and Moriarty were in on it together. That you defaced his art on purpose so you two could frame Powers.”

Sebastian scoffed. People wouldn’t believe that Powers had done all that, but they believed that Jim would let his own artwork be defaced? “Jim worked for ages on that painting. Everyone should have seen it. It was fucking _incredible_. He acted like he didn’t care when it was destroyed, but I knew it had to feel awful. You think I would want to do something like that to him?”

Miranda was looking at him curiously. “You really care about him, then?”

Sebastian rubbed at a smudge on his coffee mug. “I’m not a shitty person. That doesn’t mean we’re gay lovers, if that’s what everyone thinks,” he said. “We’re friends. Yeah, he’s weird, but he’s not as bad as everyone says.”

“So, you don’t feel anything for him?” Miranda asked, looking him in the eye.

“No-” Sebastian said, and it was amazing, how such a tiny word could carry such an enormous lie. He could hear it in his own voice, and he knew Miranda could too, because she slumped back into her chair, looking away.

“Miranda,” he said softly. “I think you’re amazing. I meant it when I said I didn’t deserve you.” He reached out and took her hand, squeezing it.

She wiped her eyes again, her hand slack in his. “Are you breaking up with me?” she asked.

Sebastian was startled. “I wasn’t...I didn’t come in here to…”

“Because maybe we should just do it. Break it off, I mean,” she sniffed loudly, snatching up a napkin and wiping her nose.

“If that’s what you want,” he said quietly.

She shook her head. “I didn’t expect things to go like this.”

“Me neither.” What else could he say? He stroked her hand, and she finally squeezed back.

“You know, it’s stupid, because I’ll miss you, and at first I didn’t even think you wanted me for anything other than sex. But you were really...you were really sweet, and I don’t want to miss you, I want to tell you to fuck off and-”

“You can tell me to fuck off if you want,” Sebastian murmured.

She laughed wetly and shook her head, then her face crumpled.“I should probably go.”

Miranda withdrew her hand and Sebastian let his own slide back into his lap. “Oh. Yeah. I’ll pay for the coffee,” he said, idiotically.

It wasn’t until Miranda had gathered her things and reached the door that Sebastian stopped her. “Miranda?”

She turned to look at him, and he wished that she could feel the right things for her, because she looked so pretty right now, so good. He thought of her bent over Philip Channing when he fainted in biology, making sure he was okay. She was so very good. “It’s really over, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.” Miranda’s hand fell slack against the door handle. “It’s over.”  
__

Sebastian stayed to finish his sandwich and coffee. He felt bad, but not as bad as he should. How long could he have kept up the charade with Miranda, that he was a stable person, a good person?

After he paid, he stepped into the chill air and lit up a cigarette. He wasn’t a good person. He wasn’t the type of person who deserved the Miranda Velasquezes of the world. No, it wasn’t that he didn’t deserve it, he realised. He didn’t want it. He leaned his head back against the wall. He felt a weight lift from his shoulders. He only wanted one person. One fucked-up, commanding, know-it-all.

Sebastian blew a plume of smoke toward the white-grey sky. God, he was so fucked. All he could do was laugh about it. He took another puff of cigarette. He laughed and laughed.  
__

On the day of the swim meet, Sebastian lingered outside of the canteen at lunchtime, looking for Powers. “Coming to the swim meet tonight, Moran?” Powers’ voice was behind him, and Sebastian tried not to jump. He turned around, looking up at the solid wall of muscle.

“Oh, is that tonight?” Sebastian asked mildly. They were in the middle of the corridor, and Sebastian could feel every pair of eyes fixed on them. Carl wouldn’t try anything here, out in the open.

“I’d love to see you there. I’d love to know you were there, watching me win,” Carl laughed.

“I’m sure you would. Don’t worry, Carl, I’ll be there,” Sebastian said, as evenly as he could manage. He strode away, enjoying the look of disappointment on Carl’s face. If he’d been trying to start a fight, he’d failed miserably.

Sebastian hadn’t seen Jim all day. He loitered by the art room for as long as he could without looking suspicious, and popped his head into the library. He would look for him at the swim meet, then, since Jim was so keen to go.  
__

Sebastian had no one to sit with at the meet. Jim was nowhere in sight, but it would be easy to miss him in the din of parents, teachers, and students crowding the bleachers. Many of the students - and even some teachers - cast Sebastian scathing glances as he walked past.

He spotted Miranda, sitting in a cluster of her girlfriends, and he looked away quickly, avoiding eye contact. He went halfway up the bleacher steps before he spotted Barnes. Maybe it had been a fluke that Barnes had ignored him before. Barnes wouldn’t believe that sort of rubbish that Powers spread, would he?

“Hey, mate. Is this spot taken?” Sebastian asked. Barnes looked up at Sebastian with complete, startled horror on his face.

“Oh- um. Yeah...yeah, sorry,” he muttered, looking away.

Oh. Sebastian backed up, a small bubble of fury rising in him. He opened his mouth to spit something back at Barnes, when Sundarum bumped past him viciously.

“Do us all a favor and sit far away from us, you fucking bummer,” Sundarum snarled. “I’m sure if Moriarty’s unavailable, that gay teacher Mr. Atkins will let you sit in his lap.”

Sebastian barked out a laugh. It was all so petty, so idiotic, that his fury melted into complete indifference. He was astonished at how little he cared about these people’s opinions of him. “Oh, is _that_ what Carl told you? That I’m gay?”

“He told us everything, _mate_ ,” Sundarum sneered. “About how you attacked him in the showers, forced him to give you a handjob. You’re fucking sick.”

These weren’t his friends, Sebastian realised. They never had been. He laughed, madly, dangerously. “I’m sick, am I? You’re a bunch of bell-ends, and you can go fuck yourselves.” He turned and walked down to the bleachers, finding an open space between some parents and a group of 11th years.

He was allegedly gay, violent, and unstable. It was perfect. Sebastian grinned threateningly at anyone who dared cast him a hateful glance. Was this what Jim felt like? Untouchable? Fed up with everyone on the whole fucking planet?

The meet began, women’s teams competing first, then men’s. When the men’s swim team stepped out, Sebastian tried to ignore Carl’s arrogant walk, the way he licked his lips lasciviously or threw smirks to his teammates. And how on earth did his awful, grating, mocking laugh carry through the shouts and echoes, directly to Sebastian’s ears?

Sebastian kept waiting for Jim to turn up. A flair of drama would be his style, perhaps flinging open the pool doors at the last minute. But everything was going as it should.

Swimming had never been a sport Sebastian had much interest in playing or watching, but he could understand why Carl stole the show. His speed and agility were breathtaking, and when he got in the water, he became an entirely new creature. Every aspect of Powers’s physique that seemed awkward or blocky out of the water transformed into fluid power when he was swimming. The entire room was adoring Powers - Sebastian could feel it. Carl won his first race of the night in the butterfly stroke. He came out, muscles gleaming with droplets of water. He looked like an untouchable god. Sebastian’s heart sank. How the hell was anyone, even Jim Moriarty, going to put this fucker in his place?

The second race was an eight-lap freestyle. Carl was ahead immediately- it was almost dull watching, knowing that he was going to win with several fat seconds to spare.

Except, midway through lap three, there was a thrashing in the water, from Powers’ lane. The announcer’s voice grew frantic, and people from the crowds stood up to see. Sebastian rose as well, his heart stopping as he heard whistles being blown, saw one of Carl’s teammates dive in the water after him.

Everything had become very surreal. There was a strange moment in the crowd, when the general excitement from the game turned into a shared, animal panic. Carl was hauled with great difficulty from the water, his body a dead weight on the concrete.

Carl Powers was unconscious. Sebastian watched with everyone else as Carl’s chest was pumped by the swim coach, as air was blown into his slack mouth, as Carl’s neck and wrist were checked for a pulse.

There was a brief moment that hung in the air for what seemed like an eternity, when time seemed to stop and the entire crowd was frozen, but then the silence erupted into worried mutters, and whispers. If this was a movie, Sebastian thought vaguely, now would be the part where Carl coughed up water in a disgusting gurgle and the crowd cheered its relief.

Instead, the coach stopped pounding Carl’s chest and murmured something to the teammate standing nearby. Sebastian could see it on their faces. The entire crowd could see this new, horrible fact - Carl Powers was dead.

The room exploded with panicked shouts. Sebastian saw Powers’s father racing over. People ran out the doors, people ran towards Carl’s body in disbelief. Sebastian felt numb. His eyes swept over the chaos, feeling oddly separate. Then, near the double doors towards the back of the bleachers, he spotted Jim Moriarty, pale and quiet, his eyes fixed on the scene, a quiet smile of absolute triumph on his face.

Then he was slipping out the door. Sebastian jostled to the bleacher stairs, elbowing his way through the pandemonium to run after him.

Jim didn’t turn around in the corridor, and Sebastian was afraid, for whatever reason, to shout after him. He could tell, somehow, that Jim knew Sebastian was following him, even though he only picked up his pace, never once turning around to look at him.

It was drizzling outside. Freezing. Sebastian had left his coat inside, he realised. He didn’t care. He could barely feel the rain. He followed Jim through the darkness to the illuminated bus stop.

“Jim-” he finally said, and when Jim turned around, his eyebrows were raised high, as if he was fucking surprised.

“What’s wrong, Sebastian? You look like you’ve seen a-”

“You killed him. Jim, you actually killed him,” Sebastian breathed, stepping closer to Jim.

Jim was the very picture of innocent shock, his eyes wide, his mouth falling softly open. “Killed who? I don’t even know what you’re talking about-”

It only took a breath to close the gap between them, Sebastian tugging Jim against his chest. He lifted his chin. Jim was so close now, Sebastian could see the flecks of color in his brown eyes. They were brown, after all, but the pupils were so dark, so hungry.

“Liar,” Sebastian growled, and then before he could think or stop himself, his lips were on Jim’s.

For a moment it felt all wrong, a horrible mistake - Jim was stiff, his lips immobile. Sebastian was about to pull away when some internal switch flipped and everything changed, and Jim was grabbing a fistful of Sebastian’s hair and kissing him back with a frantic passion that left every doubt and reservation in the dust.

Sebastian had had more artful kisses- Jim’s mouth was harsh and biting- but he’d never had one like this, so full of need and electricity. Sebastian had never had a kiss that made him wobbly at the knees and made his heart want to leap out of his chest. He gripped Jim’s narrow hips tightly, needing their bodies as close as possible. Nothing else mattered. Nothing else made sense, but this right here. Jim, in his arms. Jim - the weirdo, the psychopath, the murderer - kissing him.

 


	12. Convergence

_I can see no reason for it to fail_  
_'Cause this life is a farce_  
 _I can't breathe through this mask_  
 _Like a fool_

**_"It's A Fire" - Portishead (1994)_ **

 

The only thing that pulled Sebastian back to his senses was the increasingly loud wail of an ambulance. He pulled away from Jim as the siren became deafening. The vehicle tore past and turned into the parking lot of the school. A police car followed right behind, red and blue lights flashing in the darkness.

The reality of the situation hit Sebastian all at once like a cold brick. Jim had murdered Carl Powers. Somehow. Right? And he had kissed Jim. He had kissed a murderer.

“We need to get you out of here,” Sebastian murmured. His heart felt like it would fly out of his chest as he looked at Jim in alarm. “Come back to mine,” he said not even thinking about the words. “My parents are out tonight. My _ustani_ is out, too. You can...lie low.”

Jim mutely raised an eyebrow at Sebastian, his mouth silently repeating _ustani,_ trying to decode it.

“She’s sort of our...housekeeper. She was also my tutor and my babysitter when I was growing up,” Sebastian explained.

“Oo, your _governess,_ you mean,” Jim smirked delightedly. “How posh.” His face immediately fell neutral again, and he continued dispassionately, “I have no reason to lie low. If I had bothered to murder anyone, I would have undertaken every precaution. What happened to Powers was a freak accident, a terrible tragedy that nobody could have prevented.” The siren lights casting blue and red on his face.

Still, he leaned against Sebastian lightly, the corner of his mouth flickering upward for a second as he stared straight ahead. “Did you see how they panicked? Everyone realizing it all together. It was magnificent. A chorus responding in perfect time to the conductor’s wave.”

The bus stopped in front of them, but Jim didn’t move. “This bus doesn’t go to your neighborhood. Be a lamb and call a cab?” He looked at Sebastian as if this was a prearranged plan, as if he knew that Sebastian had money on him, as if Sebastian would obey.

Sebastian didn’t hesitate. He dug in his pockets for coins for the pay phone, and called the cab number listed on the bus stop shelter. He swallowed. He was at Jim’s beck and call….aiding and abetting a known murderer. Not that Jim had admitted it, but...it wasn’t some fluke that Carl had had a fit in the pool and died after all of Jim’s ominous talk.

Once the call was made, Sebastian pulled out a cigarette, his hand shaky as he lit it. Jim was so bloody calm. “How’d you do it?” Sebastian murmured.

The rain had picked up, and he had to shield his cigarette so it wouldn’t be extinguished. Jim didn’t mind the rain, it seemed, but Sebastian wrapped an arm over his shoulder anyway. The overwhelming urge to protect Jim had only increased, it seemed.

“Our dear friend Carl takes medicine to control his rather unfortunate eczema,” Jim said softly, so softly that Sebastian had to lean in to hear him. “He keeps his pills in his locker. It was so simple to make the switch. The poison won’t be recognized as such. That’s the rather beautiful thing about the botulinum toxin. It can be found in foods, it can be caused by wounds…if they check for it at all, they’ll come to the rightful conclusion that he must have gotten botulism, had a fit, and drowned. What poor timing, they’ll say. So sad, he was so young, so good, etc, etc.” Jim grinned eerily.

Sebastian gawped at him. “Are you fucking kidding me? You _poisoned_ him?”

Jim gave him a death stare. “Not so loud, Sebastian. And if you go with this information to anyone, you’ll be the next body they find.” He said this so casually, yet Sebastian knew he was serious. It raised the hairs on his arms.

Jim leaned against Sebastian’s body, his head brushing Sebastian’s shoulder. “I only tell you this because...God, it feels so good to _brag_...and I trust you to keep your mouth shut. Besides, even if you told people, you rather have a reputation for spreading lies now, so who would believe you?”

Sebastian should have been furious. He should have been offended, or horrified. Instead, all he wanted to do was push Jim into his bed and rip off his clothes. He breathed out through his nose, a heavy noise.

Jim turned to face him, plucking Sebastian’s cigarette from his mouth. He took a slow drag, the small ember illuminating his face. He was beautiful. Sebastian was reaching up to touch his cheek when the cab pulled up. He drew away quickly, letting Jim climb in first.

The cab ride was quiet, Sebastian and Jim’s bodies a good foot apart. If Sebastian had moved any closer, he might not have been able to restrain himself. As it was, his heart was still beating with adrenaline, and he wasn’t sure if it was from Carl’s death or Jim’s kiss.  His whole body felt wired, humming with an electric charge between them. Did Jim feel it too?

“You boys just beat the worst of the rain. Lucky,” the cab driver said, looking back at them. The rain was indeed now drumming heavily on the windows. Neither boy responded, though Sebastian spared a glance over at Jim, who had never looked so pleased, a vague smile on his face as he stared out at the foul weather.

By the time they reached Sebastian’s house, the rain was deafening. Sebastian muttered his thanks and paid the driver, running from the car to press the keycode to his townhouse gate. Jim sauntered over to join him, not seeming to mind or even notice the buckets of rain. Sebastian tugged his jacket off and over their heads, and closed the gate behind them and ran up the steps.

“My parents are out of the country,” he said breathlessly as he unlocked the door. “They won’t be back until Sunday evening.” He pushed the door open and ushered Jim inside, flicking on the foyer lights.

Jim looked around, and Sebastian felt that wave of discomfort about his wealth more acutely than ever. The Moran residence wasn’t showy by any means, but a trained eye could see the wealth in every corner of the foyer, from the original Dutch master painting near the foot of the stairs to the generations-old secretary desk, these old pieces displayed amidst tasteful, modern furnishings.

Sebastian locked the door and kicked off his wet shoes, then shucked off his sopping jacket and let it drop to the polished wood floor. Jim made no move to get warm, his threadbare jumper dripping on the floor as he looked around. His wet trainers squeaked as he drifted over toward the staircase.

“Old money is so obvious, isn’t it?” Jim said, a strange note in his voice as he idly traced a finger down the simple frame containing the Dutch master - Sebastian couldn’t be arsed to remember who the painter was. “Do you and your parents just _love_ to sneer at the garish, tasteless ‘new money’ types that swan into your upper crust neighborhood?”

Sebastian swallowed. “My parents do. Actually, my mother says they aren’t worth thinking about. ‘They might as well be chavs,’ she said once.” He shivered, the cold clothes settling on his skin. “Charming, I know.” He shifted uncomfortably as Jim examined the antique secretary desk with pursed lips. “My bedroom’s upstairs. If you wanted dry clothes,” he said quickly. “You can take off your shoes here.”

Jim wordlessly toed them off, placing them neatly on the mat. Something about seeing Jim’s smaller, shabbier shoes lined up on his rug stoked something warm inside of Sebastian. Jim’s wet hair clung to the nape of his neck. There was a hole in the toe of his sock.

Jim straightened and caught Sebastian staring, and he met his gaze challengingly. “Give me the grand tour, then,” he commanded, and followed Sebastian upstairs. On Jim’s insistence, Sebastian showed him both toilets, the guest bedroom, and his parents’ bedroom door, which his father always kept locked.

“He’s a bloody narcissist,” Sebastian explained. “As if I’d want to go snooping in my parents’ room. I think the most shocking thing I’d find in there is two separate beds.”

Jim smirked, examining the lock idly. “Perhaps they have a sex swing,” he said, looking at Sebastian archly.

Sebastian tossed his head back and cackled. “Believe me, they would be masters of deception if they were keeping a passionate love life a secret,” he said.

“Who said it was passionate? Couples do all kinds of things to stave off boredom.” He ran his fingers over the door handle. “Isn’t it amazing? The things people do just so they aren’t _bored?_ ”

Sebastian shivered; Jim’s voice had turned dark and flat, with a biting menace underneath it that would have better fit a remorseless death row prisoner. He slid his arm around Jim’s shoulders. “You must be freezing. My bedroom’s this way.”

Jim allowed himself to be ushered over the plush carpet to the opposite end of the hall. Sebastian had never thought of his room as decadent, but he could tell by the way that Jim’s eyes widened that Jim thought it so. Two large dormer windows looked out into the wet night, the walls covered in posters from Sebastian’s favorite bands. It was embarrassingly untidy, books and flannel shirts and jeans and trainers flung this way and that.

Jim’s wide eyes seemed to swallow every detail, from his untidy desk to the little-used armchair by the window, piled with laundry. He drifted to his large stereo and his wall of CDs, trailing his fingers over the music. “Play me something,” he said, his hips already drifting back and forth.

Sebastian paced slowly toward him. “What do you like?” The only thing he knew about Jim’s tastes was that he had a rather unsettling amount of knowledge on disco music, and classical.

“Spare me any grunge, if you can,” Jim said, rolling his eyes. “Play something for a rainy night,” he murmured, eyebrows furrowing at all of the CDs. He pulled out one after the other, studying each one.

“Mm. This is sort of weird...but…” Sebastian reached past him to grab a Portishead CD. He hadn’t liked them at first, all slow and strange, but the singer’s haunting voice had grabbed his attention. He popped the CD in.

Jim stood entranced, listening as the soft beats begin. Sebastian finally stepped in front of Jim, hands sliding down his damp shoulders. “Aren’t you cold?” he murmured.

“No,” Jim said, looking up at Sebastian. “Is this how you get all the girls into your bed?”

Sebastian’s breaths were shallow, his hands drifting and settling on the frayed edge of Jim’s jumper. He had permission to touch Jim, finally. There were no prying eyes in his bedroom. Yet he felt at a loss for how to proceed. It had always been so easy. But, he realised, it had been easy because nothing had been at stake. “I don’t have a script, if you can believe it…”

Jim’s hands covered Sebastian’s, and for a moment Sebastian thought Jim was going to shove his hands away, to laugh in his face and tell him that this had all been a game, all part of the plan - mass humiliation. Instead, Jim tugged his jumper up and off, casting it to the floor, then he was kissing Sebastian once more, eager and hungry, bordering on painful. Sebastian kissed back deeply, groaning as Jim’s tongue pressed between his lips. Jim all but shoved Sebastian into his armchair, and Sebastian blindly shoved a heap of laundry off the chair to accommodate them both. He tugged Jim into his lap, kissing him frantically.

Jim’s mouth was a new language to learn. Sebastian savored it on his tongue, trying to decode his patterns. Jim was an aggressive kisser, kissing as if it were a fight, and he seemed determined to win against all odds.

Sebastian moaned as Jim bit down on his tongue, and pulled back. He was panting now. “Are you trying to maul my mouth, you little vampire?” he laughed.

Jim frowned at him darkly. “Am I a bad kisser?”

“No. Very, erm, competitive, is all,” Sebastian murmured, his hand sliding into Jim’s hair.

“Aw, it’s no fun if there’s not a winner-” Jim snickered, but Sebastian cut him off with another kiss, tender and slow. His lips were closed at first, but then he slowly plied them part, his lips and tongue gentle and probing.

Jim gave a startled little noise at Sebastian’s kiss. His back arched, and Sebastian’s hand splayed over his back, heavy and warm. Jim pressed closer, and finally let his arms encircle Sebastian’s neck, fingers sliding up the bristle of hair, gripping a fistful at the crown and giving it a sharp tug.

Sebastian hissed at the pain, but he moaned, head tipping back. Jim gave him a dark little smile, twisting his hair even harder, which made Sebastian’s toes curl in his shoes. Jim had spread his legs further apart, straddling Sebastian until his arse was rubbing directly over Sebastian’s cock.

“Jesus Christ, Jim-” Sebastian breathed, and then kissed him with more force this time, all hunger. He couldn’t stop touching Jim - no matter how close he pressed against his body, it wasn’t close enough. Jim didn’t seem to mind being taken so greedily, though. Sebastian wanted them to take from each other until there was nothing left to be had.

When Jim pressed deeper into his lap and Sebastian’s cock strained against his arse- he nearly jolted at how much he wanted him. Jim drew away, his eyes locked on Sebastian. He thought he might explode from the intensity in Jim’s gaze, at how much he needed him. “Jim, please-” he begged, unsure what he was begging for. He wanted everything, and all at once.  

Jim slid off Sebastian’s lap, pressing his knees apart and settling between them, hands on his thighs. “Mind undoing your trousers for me, Moran?” he chuckled, his dark eyes lifting.

When Jim laughed, it was nothing like Carl’s, even though it was laced with a dark humor. Sebastian shivered, dutifully unzipping his trousers. His cock, heavy and hard, pushed free.

“I’m going to suck your cock, Sebastian Moran. Come down my throat, and I’ll shove a knife down your own,” Jim promised in a purr that sounded almost loving.

He stared down at Jim in disbelief. God, this was actually happening. “I- you don’t have to-” he said. He didn’t want to be anything like Carl.

Jim’s brow raised with a touch of dissatisfaction. “If you act like you don’t want it, I won’t give it to you.”

“I want it,” Sebastian said quickly, his legs spreading.

“Eyes closed,” Jim snapped. It was only when Sebastian obeyed that Jim moved closer, nosing slightly at his cock. “You want _what_ , Moran?”

“I want you. I want your mouth on my cock,” Sebastian breathed, and fuck, it was so hard to keep his eyes closed.

“There’s a good boy,” Jim’s voice lilted from somewhere below him, and hearing that in person was so much better than on the phone. Sebastian’s hands clenched the arms of the chair. He could feel Jim’s breath against his straining cock as Jim said, “But you have to ask nicely.”

“Please, Jim-” he panted.

“Better.” Fingers closed around Sebastian’s cock, giving it a few firm pumps, and then a hot, broad tongue was lathing the head, and Sebastian’s mouth fell open in a long groan. He’d had blowjobs before, eager and sloppy, but this was something so completely different. This was the best thing he’d ever felt. It was, in other words, exactly what Jim had promised him.

Sebastian panted, lost in the feeling - that is, until Jim’s nails dug painfully into his thigh and he pulled back far enough to hiss, “Look at me.”

Sebastian’s eyes snapped open. Jim looked absolutely pornographic, eyes blazing, mouth red and shiny with saliva, hair mussed. “Eyes on me, Moran. Tell me when you’re close.”

He could only nod, his cock achingly hard. How did it feel even better than the first time when Jim’s mouth covered him again, sucking in and out. He took Sebastian so deep, to the point where he could feel Jim’s throat against the head of his cock, and it was too much-

“F-fuck, Jim, I’m so close-” he shuddered.

And with that, Jim pulled away, leaving him aching. “Don’t move. Don’t you dare touch yourself,” he said. “Now. Close your eyes again.”

It was all Sebastian could do to keep his hands clenched on the chair’s arms, breathing heavily through his nose. He hated not being able to see what was going on. He could hear a rustle of clothes, a zipper going down. “You’re very obedient, Sebastian,” Jim observed, sounding pleased.

“Only to those worthy of my time.”

Jim rewarded his answer with a soft hum of approval. His fingertips traced Sebastian’s jaw, then tilted it up. “Very good, Sebastian. You know real authority when you see it.”

Sebastian’s eyelids fluttered but stayed closed as Jim’s thumb traced over his lower lip. How was such a small touch so maddeningly erotic?

Then Jim’s weight shifted, and Sebastian felt Jim straddle him once more. “Eyes closed, hands to yourself,” Jim reminded him. More shifting, a small grunt. Jim seemed to be balancing on his knees to do something. He reached back and grasped Sebastian’s cock - Sebastian couldn’t suppress a small, begging moan - then Sebastian felt a condom being rolled on. He felt the head press against something, bunched and hot, and his eyes did fly open.

Jim’s face was just an inch for his own, but Jim quickly pulled back and slapped him sharply across the face.

“Tsk, Moran. What did I tell you?” Jim said, but then he was lowering himself until the head of Sebastian’s cock breached, and then sat down on Sebastian’s cock, shuddering. “Shouldn’t - shouldn’t even be giving this to you - so - disobedient.”

Sebastian couldn’t understand a word Jim was saying. His mouth fell open, breathing shakily. “O-Oh- oh my God-”

He couldn’t have kept his eyes closed if he’d tried, couldn’t have followed a single order. It was, as Jim had promised him, so much different than a girl. So tight, so hot- Jim must have lubricated and stretched himself beforehand, because there was no way that he would just be able to sink into him like this. Then Jim began moving, just a slight motion at first, but enough that Sebastian could feel the shift of skin. It was incredible, and the only thing that was keeping him from coming was the subtle movements and the slow pace.

“I know this is your first time, Sebastian, but please reign it in for a few minutes,” Jim said dryly. How the fuck was he so calm when he had Sebastian’s cock deep inside of him? “I would like to enjoy myself, too, you know.”

Sebastian couldn’t form words to utter any sort of sensible reply. Jim grabbed his jaw, forcing him to look at him, his other hand gripping the chair for balance as he began to move up and down.

Sebastian had enough sense to remember to ask Jim for permission before his hands found Jim’s hips for support, gripping his arse as Jim began bearing down on his cock with deeper thrusts. Sebastian was lost in Jim, the feeling of him was-

“I-incredible-” he breathed, which earned a low laugh in his ear, a laugh that made the hair on his neck stand at attention.

Jim was panting something in his ear, humming a tune. “Don’t you- forget about me-” he sang through his exertions.

Sebastian laughed breathlessly, incredulously. How was he ever, ever going to forget this? Then Jim was moving at a new angle, and, oh, fuck, it was so perfect. Sebastian’s toes curled, and he let out a small keen. The chair creaked as Jim sped up.

“Please- Jim, I’m so close-”

“Hold on-” Jim panted, his nails digging into Sebastian’s neck, then he yanked his hair, hard enough to make Sebastian whimper in pain, but it did little to curb his arousal. In fact, he felt like he was bound to ricochet and lose control completely.

Jim was stroking himself now, too, Sebastian vaguely realized, and some part of him wanted to offer to help, but he was struggling to hold on, panting through his teeth, needing it-

And then suddenly, Jim stopped. He carefully sat up and pulled off of Sebastian, making Sebastian almost cry out in frustration. “Jim, please-” he panted, squirming.

Jim dismounted, careful not to unroll Sebastian’s condom, and placed a light peck on his trembling mouth. “Patience.”

Sebastian watched in agony from the chair as Jim crawled onto the bed, bracing himself on all fours and spreading his legs. He looked over his shoulder to lock eyes with Sebastian. “Undress completely. Then come and get me.”

Sebastian flew out of his chair and immediately began tearing off his clothes. His trousers were already half-down, and he kicked them and his pants the rest of the way off. He was glad to be rid of his sweaty t-shirt and damp socks. He clambered onto the bed, standing up on his knees and seizing Jim’s hips. It only took one shaky moment to align himself before he thrust in fully. It was a different angle, a new sensation, and now he had control over the thrusts. He didn’t waste any time in beginning to move, and realised he was practically toppling Jim over, making the bed shake violently. He let up to ask if Jim was okay, but Jim just gasped out, “D-don’t you dare fucking- stop-”

That was all Sebastian needed. Something feral  took over, and Sebastian snarled, clutching Jim’s hips and pounding into him with a reckless abandon that made the very core of him sing. He was riding towards something immense, something that was threatening to rip him to shreds.

“J-Jim!” Jim was reaching down to stroke himself, Sebastian realized, and if he’d had any sort of ability to think straight, he would have done the job himself, but as of now, all he could do was clutch Jim’s hips and thrust like mad.

“Come for me, Sebastian,” Jim gasped, meeting the press of his hips eagerly.

It was the same phrase on the phone, but now it really was Jim in the flesh- Jim’s voice husky, Jim’s thighs trembling, Jim’s muscles clenching around him, so tight and hot it was practically driving every coherent thought out of Sebastian’s head. And Jim was coming now, he could hear his hoarse grunt, could feel his muscles contracting and relaxing.

When Sebastian came, he wasn’t aware of his death grip on Jim’s hips or the hoarse, begging noise he made- he was only aware of intense, incredible bliss, pushing him over the edge in several long pulses. He stayed buried in Jim through the entire free fall, and when he pulled out, he collapsed on the bed, gasping like a nearly-drowned swimmer. His ears rang. He couldn’t move his limbs.

“I- I came so hard, I can’t move,” he mumbled when his mouth could form words again.

Jim shifted, pulling Sebastian’s head up to rest against his chest. “ _You didn’t do too terribly, for a straight boy_ ,” he said in French.

Sebastian smiled sheepishly, turning his face up to look at Jim, who looked deliciously debauched- his dark hair mussed, eyes shining, pale skin flushed, lips wet. Sebastian couldn’t resist moving up to kiss Jim once more, lazily and uncoordinated this time.

Everything about this was wrong. He had just had sex with a murderer, with a boy. Yet he couldn’t bring himself to care. He didn’t know what this feeling was. Obsession? All he knew was that he wanted Jim to stay here, naked in his bed, for all time. His arms slid around Jim’s sweaty skin, and he kissed his shoulder gently.

“Don’t you dare get sentimental, Moran,” Jim droned, though he didn’t push him away.

“‘M not,” Sebastian promised. How the hell was Jim so cavalier about something that had blown all of Sebastian’s conceptions of sex completely out the window? They had fit together so perfectly...even now, resting chest to chest, they just fit.

Jim cracked his neck from side to side, letting a relaxed sigh out through his nose. Then he was leveraging Sebastian’s hips over with his thighs, turning them over, and then he withdrew to sit on Sebastian’s hips. He frowned and studied Sebastian, hands resting on his chest as he cocked his head.

Sebastian felt a mixture of discomfort and entrancement as Jim’s eyes peeled him apart. Jim placed his forefinger on Sebastian’s chin, forcing his head back to stare at the headboard, and then Jim’s fingernail was tracing a clean line down the center of Sebastian’s throat, down his clavicle, his sternum, his belly, ending just above his pubic bone; a slow, scratchy tickle. Sebastian was frozen under Jim’s touch, realizing with a chilly sensation that Jim was tracing the precise incision of their lab pig. He was splayed out, naked and vulnerable, in front of a murderer.

“Now, don’t be like that,” Jim said, flicking one of his nipples.

Sebastian flinched and looked down at him. “Like what?”

“You’re wondering if you should trust me,” Jim said. “It’s terribly dull. There are so many ways I could have killed you by now, Sebastian. You gave me at least 19 different openings, and I wasn’t even tempted.”

“Well, that’s a relief.” Sebastian gave him a lopsided grin, unsure if Jim was joking or not.

“Yet,” Jim finished his sentence mildly, his fingernail digging into Sebastian’s hipbone. That was the moment when Sebastian could have pulled away, could have overpowered Jim in an instant. but instead he just hissed, his back arching slightly. He met Jim’s gaze. Jim had him. Sebastian was, in a word, fucked. Jim stared back at him, raising an eyebrow, wordlessly saying, _Yeah, you are._

“I’ve never done anything like that before,” Sebastian breathed at last, fingertips tracing over Jim’s thighs.

Jim was giving him a strange look. “Do you regret it?” he asked.

“No,” Sebastian said truthfully. He paused. “I can’t believe Powers is dead.”

Jim chuckled, pressing up against Sebastian, and tipped his face up to be kissed again. Sebastian happily obliged; he couldn’t seem to stop kissing Jim. He felt like a new person.

“You’re not afraid of the police, then?” Jim asked against his mouth.

“You said you were careful,” Sebastian rumbled slowly. “But...won’t they get suspicious, seeing as how I rather publicly beat him up several times?”

Jim shrugged lightly. “They won’t piece it together. His autopsy will show botulinum poisoning. I was very careful.” He paused and grinned slowly. “I took his shoes, though.”

Sebastian sat up a bit. “You _what_?”

Jim looked utterly pleased with himself. “A trophy of sorts, Sebastian. Don’t fret, nobody will notice they’re missing. He did so _love_ those trainers, though.”

Sebastian knew the ones Jim was talking about- designer trainers that had to be at least ten years old.  “You’re mental. Someone will notice.”

“Mmm, they really won’t,” Jim sighed blissfully.

Sebastian let his fingers trace over Jim’s skin, studying each freckle and scar. There were several scars, actually. Some clearly from burns and deliberate cuts. He drew in a breath, his thumb brushing over a crescent scar on Jim’s collarbone. “Who did these to you?”

Jim followed his hand. “Some were self-inflicted, some accidental. The others...it doesn’t matter. It’s in the past.”

“Scars aren’t in the past,” Sebastian muttered. “They force the past into the present. They mark you. Forever.”

“How dramatic,” Jim said, but he seemed pleased with the words. “But you know, death is forever, too. And Carl Powers is very much dead.”

Just then, Jim’s stomach growled loudly, making Sebastian’s own chest rumble.

“Right.” Sebastian sat up further. “You really do need to eat, or _you’ll_ be dead. So do I, actually. I’m ravenous.”

Jim sat up reluctantly, looking so small and pale against Sebastian’s sheets. It made Sebastian reluctant to leave, but he rose anyway, rolling off his condom and tying it off, chucking it in the bin before grabbing a clean t-shirt and some sweatpants from his pile of laundry. He tossed similar items to Jim, making sure to give him some drawstring trousers so Jim could adjust them to his smaller waist.

“Sorry for the size...but they’re clean and dry,” he said. Jim practically drowned in his t-shirt, his shoulders about half the width of Sebastian’s, so the sleeves pooled down his shoulders and arms. He had to roll up the hems of the sweats so he didn’t trip.

“Say the word ‘adorable’ and I’ll end you,” Jim said casually, straightening.

Sebastian barked a laugh. “Come on, you mad thing. Food.”

“Food is beneath me,” Jim actually muttered. Unbelievable.

 


	13. Memorial

_Is it up to me?_   
_You won't wait to see_   
_Screwed us both again_   
_About as close as you dare_

**_"Feel the Pain" - Dinosaur Jr. (1994)_ **

 

The Moran fridge was loaded with leftovers from Lady Moran’s philanthropists club meeting earlier that week. Sebastian set out plates of tiny bruschetta topped with olive tapenade; pink, cold prawns; lobster dip; liver pate, cheese from Switzerland and France; and a large, three-tiered chocolate and raspberry gateau, complete with delicate chocolate flowers.

“What would you like? Have anything you fancy,” Sebastian said, pulling out two delicate china plates and some cutlery.

Jim was staring with round, faintly astonished eyes at the food, and Sebastian wondered guiltily if Jim thought he was only doing this to flaunt his luxuries. “Our leftovers aren’t usually so posh. Mother hired catering for a meeting,” he explained, shifting uncomfortably.

Jim raised an eyebrow at him. “Oh, I’m _sure_ ,” he purred, slinking forward. “You know, Sebastian, it’s rather adorable how fussed you get about your wealth.” His mouth flicked up into a brief smile. “Always good to figure out weak spots…and honey, you have a _dreadful_ poker face.”

His hand slid to Sebastian’s hip, a fingernail digging painfully into the bone, and Sebastian hissed, chin tipping up a bit. He felt bewitched again, unable to move under Jim’s commanding touch. Jim chuckled darkly, then his stomach rumbled once again.

God, sometimes he forgot that Jim was human. He looked down at him sternly. “Eat. Something.”

Jim didn’t seem the least bit interested in any of the food, but finally pointed to the chocolate cake, then wordlessly turned and sauntered into the parlor.

The parlor was more for show than for comfort. Jim had apparently taken one look at the straight-backed, hard silk chairs and sofas, covered in their many small pillows, and bypassed them completely, settling on the rug in front of the enormous marble fireplace.

He was looking around at the tall bookshelves on either side of the fireplace, his eyes swallowing up each travel artifact and family heirloom when Sebastian walked in with the plates.

Sebastian’s own plate was heaped with leftovers of all kinds, looking a monstrous mess next to the tidy if generous slice of cake on Jim’s plate. He handed the cake to Jim, along with a fork, and settled beside him.

Sebastian was starting on his second bruschetta when he noticed that Jim hadn’t started eating, but was instead staring curiously at the plate.

“Do you know what sort of china this is?” Jim asked, tapping the plate so that it made a gentle clink with his fork.

Sebastian shrugged. The plate was part of an enormous set his family had, all of the pieces white with a delicate blue flower pattern. “No.”

“It’s Royal Copenhagen. Probably cost about one hundred pounds for this plate. Maybe more.”

“Oh.” Sebastian grew uncomfortable once more. “Jesus, are you trying to guilt-trip me again?”

“It’s ever so fun. And easy,” Jim said with a sly grin, and Sebastian couldn’t stop himself from putting his plate down and leaning in somewhat clumsily to kiss Jim once more.

“Build us a fire, won’t you?” Jim asked against his mouth.

Sebastian hesitated. The fireplace was hardly ever used- Sana would ask questions about it, even if his parents never noticed. But still, the thought of spending the evening next to Jim by a warm fire was too attractive to pass up.

There was a stack of chopped firewood out back, though where it had come from, Sebastian had never thought to ask. Probably imported, he smirked, bringing it inside. Soon he had a crackling blaze going, and settled in next to Jim, sliding an arm around his shoulders.

Jim had picked away at half of the cake, but had seemingly lost interest, pushing it aside. The chocolate flowers softened from the flames, and began to droop.

“What’s going to happen when we go back to school on Monday?” Sebastian whispered, pulling Jim closer. Jim shifted so that his back was against Sebastian’s chest, lounging easily against Sebastian as if he were a throne. His head fit perfectly under Sebastian’s chin.

“There will be the usual moaning on about how sad it is to lose someone so young and so full of promise...for a little while, at least,” Jim said calmly.

Sebastian grit his teeth. “That’s hardly fair, though, is it? All your talk about people turning into angels when they die young? What about all the shit he did to you? Where’s the comeuppance in that? He didn’t even have a painful death!”

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that,” Jim said, and Sebastian could hear the smile in his voice. “When people are underwater and can’t breathe, they’ll hold their breath, even past the point of complete agony.” He shifted back against Sebastian’s chest. “Carl’s vision would start to blur after a minute or so, but he likely had all of his wits about him. There would have been time for him to panic, time for him to realise that he was dying, time for regrets to flash before his eyes. All of my studies of drowning confirm that death by drowning is absolute torture. Don’t fret, Sebastian. Powers had a very painful death indeed.”

Sebastian shivered. Jim sighed blissfully. “As for the rest, have a bit of faith, Sebastian,” Jim said quietly, and then fell silent.

Despite Jim’s chilling descriptions of drowning, the crackle of the fire and the drumming rain outside were incredibly relaxing. Sebastian’s hands had taken to slowly trailing over Jim’s legs and arms, a mesmerised caress. Eventually Sebastian shifted to lie on the rug, pulling Jim next to him to spoon against him. The boy stiffened for a moment, then relaxed in Sebastian’s warm, heavy hold. Sebastian allowed himself to stroke over Jim’s ribcage, and down along his hip. His lips found Jim’s warm neck, and Jim emitted something akin to a purr.

It was perfect, until Jim stiffened again and sat up suddenly. “What time is it?” he demanded.

“Mmm...dunno,” Sebastian looked lazily back at the antique grandfather clock. “Jesus. Apparently it’s nearly ten,” he said, but Jim only frowned, hastily standing. “Will you get in trouble if you’re not home?”

“No. But. I should go. I’ve stayed too long.” Jim was shaking his head back and forth, seemingly at himself. “This wasn’t part of the plan,” Sebastian heard him mumble.

“Jim, you’re free to stay here. We have the whole place to ourselves,” Sebastian said, moving to catch Jim before he bolted from the room.

Jim looked up at him curiously. “I should go. This was a mistake, getting attached,” he said dully.

“What?” Sebastian faltered, then grabbed Jim’s waist with a new resolve. They made sense together. How could Jim deny that? “Jim- if I did something wrong, let me know. But can’t you stay a bit longer?”

Jim paused, then looked up at him blankly. “I have to go,” he said again.

“Why?” Sebastian asked.

For a moment Jim said nothing, then he finally looked at the curtain-covered window beyond Sebastian’s shoulder. “Sometimes I enjoyed sex with Carl, you know. He gave me what I wanted. Pain. A complete distraction from all…” He gestured vaguely to his forehead. “This _thinking_. But even when the sex was good, he was still using me..”

“I’m not Carl. For fuck’s sake, Jim...”

Jim rolled his eyes. “Trust me, Moran, you’ll tire of me. You’re only interested right now because nobody has ever treated you like I do. Don’t worry. You’ll find someone else to slap you around and give you orders. I have more important things to do.”

Sebastian stared at him, dumbfounded. How could Jim think that Sebastian would ever tire of him? How could Sebastian explain how _right_ everything felt when he and Jim were together? In desperation, he sank to his knees in front of Jim. “Jim, I’m not using you. God, didn’t you feel it back there? I could never use you. Please, just stay a bit longer. Let me prove it to you.”

Sebastian had no more words than this, and neither did Jim. Jim looked down at him, a slow bond of trust beginning to unfurl around them. Jim’s fingers cautiously pressed into Sebastian’s hair, as if checking to make sure he was real.

Sebastian kept his gaze locked on Jim’s. “I’m yours.” He hadn’t planned on saying it, but it was undeniably, painfully, true. He was in the palm of Jim’s hand, split open by him like a specimen.

“Mine…” Jim considered the word. He mouthed it again, seeming to love it on his tongue. He cocked his head, then slid his hand down to trail his thumb slowly along Sebastian’s brow. Sebastian’s eyes closed slowly, enraptured. “Yes, I suppose you are, aren’t you?”

Jim stayed. They snogged again on the rug in front of the fire, Jim making snide comments about what a cliche it was, if only they had swapped out the Persian rug for a bearskin, until Sebastian shut him up by pressing his mouth over his cock. He was shocked by how much he loved it- Jim’s reaction was the best part, of course, watching his back arch in the flickering light and his mouth hang out. Hearing him pant as Sebastian tasted him slowly, feeling his balls and back to his arse.

Sebastian had always heard of blowjobs as a degrading act. He himself had muttered “cocksucker” at an opposing team member, and jokes about giving head always got such a cheap laugh in the locker rooms. This felt completely different. Sacred. Jim’s cock in his mouth was velvety, vulnerable, a new universe to explore and understand. His brow furrowed as he thought about how the people at school would treat him if they knew what he did, if they knew that he _loved_ this so much, but he threw the thought out. It was irrelevant. They were nothing, and they weren’t here. This was just him and Jim. No one else.

When he made Jim come with just his mouth and tongue, it felt like a miracle, and the way Jim twitched and lost himself for a moment was like seeing a whole new facet of him.

It was now nearing one in the morning, the fire reduced to pulsing red embers. Jim at last seemed tired as well. “Come to bed with me,” Sebastian whispered, kissing up Jim’s throat.

“I should go,” Jim mumbled, but all resolve had seeped from his voice. He even allowed Sebastian to hoist him up in his arms, mute as Sebastian carried him up the staircase and into bed. Sebastian pulled the covers around them both, Jim making some distant comment about the audacious size and softness of his bed, but Sebastian was soon covering him with his own body, their sleepy limbs tangling together. Sleep found Sebastian in seconds and he succumbed, weary, warm, and blissful.

__

Sebastian woke up to cold light streaming through his bedroom window. The space next to him in bed was empty and cold. He sat up, feeling almost hungover. Yesterday came back to him in pieces. Had it all really happened? He could still smell Jim’s skin on his pillow. Sebastian sat up. “Jim?” On his armchair, the t-shirt and sweats he’d loaned to Jim were folded up neatly. Jim’s own clothes were gone.

Sebastian swore quietly. Why had Jim fled without even so much as a goodbye? He would let him have it in biology on Monday.

When he shifted, he felt a crinkle of paper. A folded-up page, torn from a notebook. He unfolded it.

_Don’t you forget about me, Moran. I’ll be seeing you. xox  JM_

Sebastian swallowed. It sounded like a goodbye.

Hurt, he reluctantly got up, showering and dressing. He wasn’t able to banish Jim from his mind,and there were remnants of Jim everywhere - a tied-off condom on his bedroom floor, ashes in the fireplace, a Royal Amsterdam china plate with hardened cake crumbs.

He cleaned it all up hastily, erasing all evidence of Jim’s visit before Sana or his parents returned home.

__

On Monday, the hallways were buzzing with rumors about Carl’s death.

“I heard it was some sort of fit. A seizure?”

“Yeah, he drowned!”

“Did you see it happen?”

“Were you there?”

“I was out buying popcorn and I came back in-”

“I know the paramedic who tried to save him-”

It was endless. Sebastian spoke to no one, until Sundarum clipped him on the shoulder in the hallway between classes. “I bet you were excited to hear that Powers kicked it, huh, Moran?” he said, acid in his voice.

“That’s a pretty fucked-up thing to say,” Sebastian growled. God, he hoped he wouldn’t be implicated in all of this.

He kept waiting for a call to the principal’s office, for a police officer to show up in his classroom door.

In biology, Jim was nowhere to be seen. Miranda kept her back turned to him the entire lecture, but he could see her shoulders tense when Ms. Beauchamp mentioned Powers’s death.

In the days following, Sebastian took to packing his lunch, not wanting to be around anyone. Nobody held any sort of friendliness toward him. And worse, Jim was nowhere to be found. Sebastian had kept the two scraps of paper, the goodbye note and Jim’s phone number. He called Jim’s flat on Wednesday, and the same impatient-sounding woman picked up.

“Is Jim around?” he asked.

“He doesn’t live here anymore,” she said.

“Oh...do you have a number where I might reach him?”

“I can’t give that information out to random strangers. Who is this?”

“I’m Sebastian Moran. I knew Jim from school. ...We were lab partners.” Lab partners, and then friends, and then lovers. How quickly their relationship had changed in a few short months.

“Well, he’s transferred schools, so it’s not your concern.”

“But-”

She hung up before Sebastian could think of a new excuse to ask for Jim’s phone number. A new foster family. Had he been planning this along with Carl’s death? If so, couldn’t he have bothered to write a new number or address on his stupid goodbye note?

Sebastian slammed the phone down and lit a cigarette. Typical Moriarty. Wanting to be in control. Leaving Sebastian dangling. Didn’t Jim care at all?

__

The very next day, on the eve of Carl Powers’ school memorial service, three identical, thick envelopes were delivered to the local TV news station, the newspaper, and to St. Crispin’s headmistress. The contents of each were the same: A videotape of carefully edited school security footage, a cassette tape of incriminating conversations and non-consensual sexual encounters, and explicit, threatening notes in Carl Powers’ handwriting. The contents of each were filthy, lurid, and abominable, yet none of the sources revealed the precise identity of Carl’s victim; only that he was another male student.

It was too juicy a story not to be picked up. It was all over the evening news, and in the next morning’s paper.

The corridors of St. Crispin were in utter pandemonium. The school memorial service was postponed. Many doubted they would have one at all. Camera crews and journalists waited outside the school like scavengers, looking for students to interview.

Most of the teachers told students to keep to themselves and to let this all blow over. It was a tragic, confusing time for them all.

It didn’t blow over, though. The following week’s headlines were dominated by Carl Powers’s name, and it seemed each day, there was a new story of another student coming forward with confessions of abuse from Powers. It hadn’t been just Sebastian and Jim who had suffered under Powers’s hands, and Sebastian supposed he shouldn’t be surprised.

All told, five boys stepped forward with stories of abuse from Powers, most wishing to remain anonymous.  

The more sensational news outlets circled back to Carl’s death with questions of murder motivations, which had worried Sebastian sick. However, the speculation quickly died - there was no evidence, and the autopsy reports had been conclusive.

It would have been so much more satisfying, Sebastian thought, if Carl had been alive to see his downfall...but his father’s reaction almost made up for that. Mr. Powers tried to accuse the newspapers and the victims of libel, but he was shut down with the glaring evidence, both video and audio, of his son, clearly raping someone.

Jim, that bloody little genius. Now everyone spoke of Carl Powers with revulsion. Powers’s memorial page was left absent from the school yearbook after massive protests, the cabinet of his swimming trophies in the front corridor was emptied. There were no posthumous honors for him, no fond memories shared at an assembly. The most generous teachers called Powers “complicated”, but most refused to talk about him altogether.

Jim had crushed Powers, destroying his name, his reputation, and ending his life. Sebastian only wished Jim was around to enjoy the results. Where was he now? During classes, Sebastian would daydream about Jim off somewhere, collecting newspaper clippings like a little magpie. Perhaps he framed them around Carl’s shoes, a mad little shrine. It would be just like Jim to do.

But did Jim ever think of him? Had that rainy night at Sebastian’s been a mere diversion for him? The thought that it had all meant nothing tore Sebastian up inside. He would come home with a stomach ache from missing him so much. And not a night in bed went by that he didn’t think of Jim.

Sana even noticed. She had even called him “lovesick”, wrongly thinking he was upset over his breakup with Miranda. He let her believe it.

Sebastian had far too much free time now that he had no friends or sports practices to occupy himself with. He used his free time to excel at his coursework and study firearms intensively. He also started target practice; if he was to go into the military, he thought, he might as well become a better shot.

Target practice began as a weekend hobby, but turned into a daily passion, one that his father approved of. “That aggression has to go somewhere,” he said, and even arranged Sebastian a personal trainer and a pass for the shooting range at the correctional school.

Sebastian moved to the dreary boarding school in Hull in January. He kept to himself there. It was easier that way, and it was shockingly liberating, not worrying about being liked. Popularity was a game he was done playing, and he openly sneered at those who fretted over how many and which friends they had.

The school emphasized discipline, and Sebastian became an exemplary pupil. He was top of his class for drill exercises, and the best marksman of any of his peers. He had never seen his father look so proud, or seen Sana look so disappointed, when he had announced that he planned to join the military immediately after finishing his term. He tried to convince Sana that he would have plenty of opportunities to practice his languages if he joined, but she wouldn’t hear of it, and barely spoke to him when he was home for the mid-term spring holiday.

“You’ve hardened, Sebastian,” Sana had remarked. “Too much like your father, I think.”

Sebastian felt hardened. It was a good thing, he decided. Safer that way. Softness led to caring, and caring led to loss, to fury. He didn’t lash out at his fellow students, because he didn’t care enough about any of them. If there was any weakness left in him, any emotional pulp inside, it was for the boy who had infuriated him, entranced him, changed him, and left him forever.

But where had caring for Jim gotten him? He'd been carelessly tossed aside with a vague promise of seeing him in the future. And it fucking hurt, caring for him. Missing him. Because despite his best efforts, he still did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Holy cow, just one more chapter to go!!! Thank you so so much for reading, all. This is was so fun to write.


	14. Call Me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hot damn, the last chapter!!! Thank thank you for reading!! <3

_After tonight if you don't want this to be_   
_A secret out of the past_   
_I will resurrect it, I'll have a good go at it_   
_I'll streak his blood across my beak and dust my feathers with his ash_

_**"Farewell Transmission" - Ohia (2003)** _

 

_October 2008_

Sebastian put himself into position, one hand steadying the scope, the other adjusting the rifle’s tripod. He put in his earpiece, a new purchase as of last week. It was already paying for itself - his neck had gotten unbearably stiff from pinning a mobile phone between his ear and his shoulder during jobs. He was only 30, but he seemed to get achy so much faster than he had in the line of duty just a few years ago. They said drinking, smoking, and stress aged you - Sebastian was living proof.

The earpiece had been a big investment, considering that he lived paycheck to paycheck, but this hit paid big - five thousand quid. That would be enough to pay off almost half of his gambling debts, and maybe he could put a little bit aside for a nice bottle of whiskey and some good cigarettes, instead of the cheap shit he got by on.

His hand-rolled cigarette hung loosely between his lips as he peered through the scope, searching for his target. He’d gotten the description, but no name. He didn’t need to know the names of the people he was killing. It was a busy area; hence the high reward, Sebastian wagered. Either that, or somebody really didn’t like this man.

He scratched his stubble, scanning for his target in the crowd. “Is he the one in the grey suit?” He asked his current employer through the earpiece.

“Yeah. Light grey. Dove.”

“That’s pretty fucking specific,” Sebastian smirked, adjusting his scope.

“I used to work in a suit shop,” the employer said defensively. “You learn a lot of fucking shades. I never knew there were so many variations of grey. Dove, gainsboro, charcoal, Davy’s Grey, Spanish Grey-”

“Got him.” Sebastian zeroed in on his target, a man with slicked-back dark hair. His dove grey suit was impeccably tailored, and his shoes shone brightly. Sebastian could smell the money oozing off him, even from five storeys up. The soon-to-be-dead man was on his mobile, chatting. He turned in Sebastian’s direction...then Sebastian swore he gazed directly up at him, and fucking _waved._

Spooked, Sebastian pulled back for a second. He was about to ask if his employer was _positive_ they hadn’t been followed, when an arm grabbed him around the neck from behind. Caught off-guard, Sebastian wrestled to get free, every muscle in his body primed for fighting.

If it had been a one-man ambush, Sebastian would have been back into position in minutes, but there were three of them. He scuffled, punched, and kicked, but there were six hands on him now - two on his neck, two grabbing his wrists, and two around his waist. Then a pair of hands retreated and Sebastian felt a needle pierce his neck.

Sebastian yanked a wrist free, managing to strike backwards. He heard the satisfying crunch of breaking bone - he’d hit the bridge of the man’s noses - and he hit again, lower, aiming for his other captor’s gut. He swung wide, feeling uncoordinated. His fist felt heavy, clumsy. His vision blurred, and his knees buckled. Shit- what had they injected him with?

He sagged to the ground, a doubled image of a large man standing above him, on his mobile.

“Target acquired, boss. Where do you want him?”

His words muddled and greyed, and Sebastian couldn’t understand anything else he said, falling prey to darkness.

__

Sebastian woke in a chair, very much alive. His head hammered. He tried to open his eyes, but his lashes pushed against cloth. A blindfold. Jesus Christ.

He tugged on his wrists, firmly bound with rope. Rope was better than handcuffs...sometimes. This was a thorough job, though, and he felt more ropes digging into his thighs and his ankles.

He tried to even his breathing. He was to be interrogated, then. What information did they want from him? He didn’t know anything worth all of this trouble.

Before he could weigh his options any further, footsteps approached, then a fist collided with his gut, making him gasp hoarsely and squirm in the chair. It was quickly followed by a harsh blow to his face. The pain only felt more intense with his sight stolen from him.

“That’s for my nose, you bloody prick,” a stuffed-up voice growled.

Sebastian forced a grin, his own face throbbing. “I think the order usually is, questions first, blows later. Or is this all part of your intimidation game?”

That earned him another punch to the nose. Sebastian felt his nose crack, breaking. Blood pooled from his nostrils- he could feel it trickle against his lips. He spat, breathing through his mouth now. What did they _want_ from him?

No questions came, though, and Sebastian couldn’t get a word out, and the blows kept coming until he was battered and aching.

They weren’t breaking bones, he thought faintly. At least not serious ones. Yet.

Then, as quickly as the blows had begun, they stopped. Sebastian heard new footsteps approach, and he twisted his wrists in the ropes, breathing raggedly. The figure was directly in front of him now, and Sebastian spat blood blindly, bracing himself for another blow.

Instead of a punch, though, a gentle hand slid along Sebastian’s jaw, and tipped his face up. “ _You’ve let yourself go, Mr. Moran._ ”

The man spoke French. Unexpected...yet the voice seemed familiar. Sebastian racked his brain, trying to think of who this could be. He had known a few French people in the army, but nobody who sounded quite like this. It was a curious sort of French, with a bit of a sing-song lilt to it, soft as the man’s hand.

“ _Is that right?”_ Sebastian grit out. Every inch of him fucking _hurt_ . “ _How very flattering to have a stalker._ ”

The hand withdrew and slapped him sharply across the cheek, making Sebastian grunt. When the man seized his chin again, his grip was harsher, vice-like. “ _A dishonorable discharge from the military, and then nothing but boozing, gambling, and some rather sloppy bar fights in the meantime. What’s wrong, Mummy and Daddy’s money burnt out? Or did they cut you off? I certainly wouldn’t blame them. If it wasn’t for the quality of your hits, Mr. Moran, I wouldn’t find you worth my time at all.”_

Sebastian bristled. Who the fuck was this, and how did he know about his parents? Sebastian didn’t divulge his family history to anyone. Especially after his father had disowned him. Sebastian squirmed again, wanting him to get to the point. “ _What’s it to you? It’s my life, isn’t it?”_

 _“And what a waste of a life,”_ the voice spat furiously.

Sebastian opened his mouth to retort, but lost his words as he felt weight on his lap- the stranger was straddling him, sitting in his lap. Sebastian grit his teeth, struggling, but then the unmistakable cold end of a gun was pressing underneath his jaw, and the stranger had a fistful of Sebastian’s hair, tugging his head back. Sebastian could make out faint light through his blindfold, enough to tell his face was pointed directly up toward the ceiling lamp.

“Tsk, Sebastian, Sebastian, Sebastian…” the voice said, in English this time, and the way the man pronounced his name sent a long-dormant shiver down his spine. “Really, drunken insubordination and gambling? I _am_ disappointed,” he sighed, then the gun was being forced between Sebastian’s teeth, and he gave a muffled protest around the barrel, eyes widening behind the blindfold.

“Oh, make that noise again. That was simply delicious…” the man breathed, this time against his ear. He didn’t let up on his cruel grip in Sebastian’s hair. Sebastian’s eyes watered, and he breathed raggedly through his nose. There was something especially intimate about this- he was used to interrogators trying to get under his skin, but this man was actually managing to burrow his way in.

“All those petty little hits, all those wasted hours tracking nobodies for a few hundred pounds...when really, we both know you’re built for such better work…” To Sebastian’s shock, the man was rocking against his lap, just the slightest movement, but one that made Sebastian shift uncomfortably, the pleasurable friction cutting through the pain and begging for his attention.

"Nng-” Sebastian could only reply, which only resulted in the gun being pushed further into his mouth. He gagged slightly, his jaw aching.

“Oh, pet...don’t pretend like you don’t _enjoy_ this just a tiny bit. When was the last time you had a truly life or death thrill? Sebastian Moran, the danger junkie…” The man laughed again, rocking more decidedly against him, and Sebastian _knew_ that voice. The accent...it was _almost_ Irish, but just when he thought he had a grip on it, the vowels would skitter to a different region. Welsh? Scottish? South London? Fuck, it was impossible to tell, and it was so very disarming.

“I followed you in the military. Exemplary work,” the man continued. “The finest rifleman on this little island, I’d dare say. Now look at you. What the hell is your excuse?”

He withdrew the gun from Sebastian’s mouth and cuffed him across the face. He was clearly waiting for an actual answer, but Sebastian instead whispered, “Who are you?”

The man clucked his tongue, and again his breath was hot against Sebastian’s ear. “Don’t you forget about me,” he sang quietly.

The voice...it clicked into place, and a face snapped into his mind’s eye - a pale, serious face.Wide, hungry eyes, dark hair, a soft, dangerous voice. The smell of formaldehyde. The smell of the art room. Jim’s hands in his hair. Jim saying his name, three velvet syllables.

“Jim Moriarty-” he breathed. Could it really be him? Had he gone completely mental? “Jim?”

The man snickered against his ear. “Jim? Jim!” He gasped, as if coming to a revelation himself. If it was Moriarty, that bewitching boy from school, he was far less serious, and perhaps even more unhinged. He ground down on Sebastian’s lap in a slow, rocking way that made Sebastian hiss. God. Jim Moriarty. He’d never forgotten him, but he’d long since given up hope of ever seeing him again. How could he had ever forgotten the first boy he’d ever bedded, the first boy he’d...well, been in love with wasn’t the right word...he’d been obsessed with him. The only person he would ever kneel in front of and beg for. And the only person he’d allowed to break his heart.

A long-dormant ache bloomed in Sebastian’s heart, and he opened his mouth to say something else when he felt the tip of the gun drift from his throat to his temple. It pressed against an already-sore bit of skull, making Sebastian hiss in pain. The man’s- Jim’s?- fingers pressed to his lips before he could speak. “I find it most audacious that you tried to kill me, Moran. Then again, you always were an audacious one.”

This couldn’t be real. He had to be hallucinating this. If he could just take the damn blindfold off-

“-Need to see you-” he mumbled against the man’s fingers.

“Tsk, as I said. _Audacious._ ” His hand withdrew and slapped Sebastian hard, then before his head had stopped whipping to the side, Sebastian heard him click his fingers twice. There were footsteps approaching behind him, then another needle in his neck, making him sag in the chair, numbing him to the pain.

He felt like he was floating out of his chair, weightless, a hot breath in his ear whispering, “Call me if you want a real job.”

__

Jim was still as a stone as he waited for Sebastian to slip into complete unconsciousness.

Grimsby was cleaning off the syringe and stowing it back in its case. “Where do you want him, boss?” he grunted.

Jim’s eyes flickered up to his hitman’s face, his bloodied nose. God, it made him giddy to see his own roughed up by the felled beast underneath him. “Step out for five minutes, and close the door. Instructions after that.”

Grimsby left without question. The very first thing Jim did was to grasp Sebastian’s broken nose and push it back into place.

Only then did he slide off the blindfold and stare at Sebastian Moran full in the face for the first time in thirteen years. Oh, he had seen him before today, in blurry surveillance photos, in newspaper clippings, in prison mugshots. His boy was too bloody conspicuous. He would need to fix that. Still...what a good show he put on. Jim allowed his thumb to trail over Sebastian’s lower lip. And nothing compared to seeing someone again in person, up close.

As a teenager, he’d been so _handsome_ , bordering on pretty, bordering on dreadfully generic, all wholesome and athletic. A boy girls fantasized about introducing their mothers to. Good breeding and lucky genetics made a sickeningly attractive combination.

But now, combat, bar brawls, and smoking had rendered him into something roughly hewn and wild, the creature he was always meant to be. Scars flecked his face and neck. His nose had been broken at least twice before today. His stubble only emphasized his chiseled jaw, and a crease was forming between his brows. He had been pretty before. Now he was gorgeous.

“Nice to see you’ve only appreciated in value, pet,” Jim murmured.

He leaned in and licked a bloody smear from Sebastian’s cheek. His Sebastian. His lips grazed to Sebastian’s slack mouth, and he stole a kiss from those lips. Jim generally found kissing distasteful; there was little point to it. But this...it was all blood, metal, and cigarettes, and he wanted to wrap himself in that taste forever. He gave himself one minute to indulge himself. Sixty seconds of being that skinny, scrappy fifteen year old again, high from his first kill. High from the utter devotion in Sebastian’s silver gaze as the older boy looked up at him from his knees.

When the minute was up, Jim straightened, clearing his mind and cracking his neck from side to side. He slid from Sebastian’s lap and returned to the door, where Grimsby was waiting. “Take him to his flat. There are a few things to do when you get there…” He scribbled down a list, then lingered in the doorway for a moment to watch as Sebastian was untied and dragged down the corridor.

The last time he’d said goodbye to Sebastian, it had been in Sebastian’s sleep. That night, as the rain drummed on the large windows and the sloped roof of the Moran residence, Jim hadn’t slept a wink. He had watched as Sebastian quickly drifted off, and then he was free to admire him, to skim light fingertips along his pulse points, across the breadth of his shoulders and down his gorgeous back. Jim had been surprised at how calm he’d felt. He’d never had such a lasting effect after sex before. Usually he got a minute of peace in his mind, maybe two, before the thoughts came crashing back in, fighting for attention. In Sebastian’s arms, listening to the larger boy’s steady, slow breath, Jim had felt miraculously calm. He had been reluctant to leave, but the hours passed and the rain died down, and Jim knew he couldn’t afford to stay any longer.

Sebastian, the dear tiger, slept soundly as Jim had slipped from his arm and quietly dressed in the dark. He’d left the note by his pillow, then lingered at his bedroom door, watching his sleeping form. “See you later, Sebastian Moran,” he’d murmured. He hadn’t known how long it would be until he did see him again, at least face to face. He knew it might be a while.

How fitting. He’d said goodbye to Sebastian while he was unconscious, and now he’d properly greeted him while he was unconscious as well.

It was interesting to note, Jim thought, as he’d combed through surveillance photos of Sebastian in his flat, that Sebastian had ended up getting a tiger tattoo. And it wasn’t a half-hearted commitment, either, not some one-sitting job on the arm that could be done on a whim. The tiger leapt across the breadth of his back in full color. Had others called Sebastian a tiger, as Jim had? His mouth twitched in displeasure at that thought. He would grill Sebastian over that in their next meeting. For this time, they would be meeting much sooner than before.

__

Sebastian twitched to life, brain scrambled, head splitting open in pain. He moved his neck to the side and felt more pain. Every limb that he called into action screamed in murderous protest. He swore, spitting blood onto the floor. Which floor?

He groggily opened one eye, the only one that would cooperate. The other was swollen shut. He was on his stomach on the floor of his studio flat. Thank fuck for that, at least.

The first thing he did was scan with his limited vision for empty booze bottles, or other signs that he’d blacked out. None to be found.

Like a bad dream, pre-blackout moments swam back to him. He’d been tied up, beaten up. Blindfolded. He looked at his wrists to confirm. Rope burns. He mustered his courage and sat up, crying out at the pain. If his rib wasn’t broken, it was at least cracked, and the pain was tear-inducing. Well, there was the beating confirmed.

“F-fuck-” And through all of this pain, he had the fucking eighties song “Don’t You Forget About Me” stuck in his head.

He staggered to his feet, legs wobbly. His head was going to split open. He stumbled blindly to his toilet. Thank fuck it was a tiny flat- any direction he went, he wouldn’t have to go further than twenty paces. He grabbed his bottle of ibuprofen and swallowed three dry.

When he closed the mirrored cabinet, he inspected his face. A bloody horror show. He forced his lips apart in a grisly smile. No missing teeth. A fucking miracle.

His smile relaxed into a frown. There was something he was missing. _Why_ had he been tied to a chair and beaten? There must have been a reason.

_Love's strange, so real in the dark_

_Think of the tender things that we were working on..._

That fucking song. 6th form. Jim Moriarty. That boy…

He shook his head, then immediately winced at the throbbing pain the slight movement had caused. That couldn’t be right.

_Slow change may pull us apart_

_When the light gets into your heart, baby…_

Yes. Jim Moriarty. He hadn’t seen him. But that voice. Moriarty’s warm breath against his ear. Hips bearing down on him. A red thread of arousal winding through the black cords of pain.

He huffed. That would be just about right, he thought, his old teenage flame coming back to tell Sebastian exactly what sort of loser he’d become.

He staggered back into the room. His studio was spartan and wholly depressing, a shrine to empty cans and bottles and rotting takeaway boxes. He’d been much tidier before he’d started drinking.

He stumbled, knocking an empty whiskey bottle to the floor. He flinched, but it didn’t shatter, only making a loud thunk that sent a twinge through his head.

“Shit…” he breathed, staring at the intact bottle. He hadn’t completed the hit. This meant he wasn’t getting his five grand. Peters would be pounding on his door, looking for his dues, and Sebastian was in no shape to tell him off.

But...it also meant that Sebastian hadn’t inadvertently killed Jim Moriarty. That gave him pause. The thought of doing such a thing made him actually feel something. It was an interesting idea. Killing someone hadn’t made him feel anything in a very long time, other than the short-lived adrenaline rush that was beginning to feel more shallow with every hit.

He immediately lurched for the cabinet where he stored his liquor. He knew he had at least a fifth of vodka in there. The cabinet was empty. He checked the other cabinets. Had he misplaced the bottle?

Beer. There was beer in the fridge. He flung it open. Takeaway boxes, brown sauce and mustard bottles, packets of soy sauce, a half-eaten tin of beans. Not a single can of beer.

He swore, spinning to grab his wallet from his pocket. He had to at least have a fiver that would get him a few 40s.

His wallet was also missing.

“What the FUCK!” he snarled, about to storm over to paw through his coat. That’s when he noticed the china plate sitting on the tiny kitchen island, comically pristine amidst the crumpled receipts and grubby wooden chopsticks and bottle caps and loose change.

A familiar plate, one that had no business being in this hovel. The plate was a pure white, painted with a lacy blue flower design - the exact pattern that had adorned his family’s china set when he was growing up. Royal Copenhagen.

On the plate was an immaculate slice of chocolate cake. The delicate curls of dark chocolate were mocking, the ganache on top smoothed to a mirror finish. The cake was deliciously moist, looking better than anything Sebastian had eaten in a very long time.

There were three impossible things on his kitchen counter. The plate and the cake were two. The third was the blaring yellow sticky note and its permanent marker scribble: _Call me. :) x JM._ Followed by a phone number.

Sebastian didn’t know how long he stared at the note. It wasn’t until his face started aching that he realized that he was smiling. _Grinning._ Like a madman.

“Jim Fucking Moriarty,” he laughed, shaking his head. Jim Moriarty, that bastard. The boy who had abandoned him after a night of murder and bliss. The man who had kidnapped him and insulted him, who had practically forced a gun down his throat.

Sebastian’s booze and wallet might have been missing, but his phone had been carefully placed right next to the slice of cake on the kitchen island.

_Call me. :) xJM_

Sebastian did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since I'm working on a sequel (finally), I decided to insert some 1995-era songs for each chapter! (Lots of grunge, y'all.) You can find the playlist of all 14 songs on Spotify :O :) :)  
> https://open.spotify.com/user/cavernism42/playlist/37vXhPcupxdmWrR6s0j0oB


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